Shadows of the Aether

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 6 - Seers - Part 4

Abyss of Memory

“Efendí…” the Comis said once more, as he had every three hours for the last six days.
“We must breach the door,”
Druhanne shook his head
“If the Hanshõ requires us he will call,” he insisted despite all logic as they stood outside the Reclusiam of the Hanshõ’s apartments on the ship.

ÇelÍk - who had been Berkant until the Hanshõ failed to remember his name and gave him another - was not convinced
“Efendí, the Hanshõ…” he paused, unable to speak ill of his master.
“...you know as well as I…the Hanshõ’s Wa is…troubled.”

Everyone knew, yet none could speak of it. 

The Kuru was slowly poisoning the Hanshõ.  By the Voices it was a slow process, and the Hanshõ had survived longer than any other of the ancient Gaki by millenia…yet it was inevitable - one could not consume the legions of Anzat Druhanne had seen through his genetic memory that the Hanshõ had and avoid it.

“Another day…the supplies are running low with our…guests…” Druhanne conceded

A scratching sound at the door removed the need to wait.

<<<<<>>>>

As variegated as the vessels they had come on,  61 Anzat stood on the decks of the Kitsune. 

There were tattooed bouncers with tree trunk arms glaring, near feral predators with elongated maws almost naked hunched and sniffing, refined noblemen and scholars in the finest robes and shimmersilks.

Mercenaries. Assassins.  Professors.  Simple bloody handed murderers, and everything in between had obeyed the primal pull of the Yokusei, stealing, buying or piloting their own vessels across the sector, from single engine barely functional fighters, to luxury yachts, and motley blocky tugs, even a handful of military vessels.

After three days of recovery following six of drawing deep on the Yokusei - or rather the Kuru drawing on him - Rannek sensed only disgrace and miscegenation, only five were pure caste, all smelt of weakness and the taint of Outsiders, were they Lek’un he would have not hesitate to cull them as ill bred wretches.

How some had not been drowned as infants by their parents in the old tradition of disposing of unfit offspring he would never know.   

“I understand now why the Caste system and Kindes collapsed,” Rannek whispered as he paced before them, his words in the Pure Anzati tongue translated by the strength of the Yokusei forcing meaning into the Anzat’s minds.

“No Kinde would accept such filth!” he screamed into one’s face, the filthy female - she showed less of the grace and refinement of the gentler sex than his cold dead Father did - her face marred by tribal tattoos and blue ink eye colouring.

“Beneath druf,” he stabbed a finger at Kree, then trailing it past the assembled crowd to the Efendí

“Less than Lek’un...you should have been aborted in the womb rather than disgrace the heritage of Anzat, you do not deserve the name that once meant ‘Emperor’,”

The enormity of the insult was lost on the majority of them, born too late and too far from Anzat prime, raised and exposed to cultures too egalitarian.

A mercenary commander scoffed at the old Clucirs anachronistic blathering.

It was a foolish mistake.

“You are not Anzat,” Rannek sniffed indignant
“Even the lowliest druf shared in the dignity of our culture...you creatures have our blood but possess no souls, no caste or Kinde! Efendí!” he pointed at the sneering mercenary

“Correct this one to the fourth degree!”

Druhanne stiffened
“Hanshõ I…”

“You fear you are not strong enough, then have the Sonae perform it!” Rannek demanded, Druhanne complied, summoning the burliest nearby Yari-gami to strip, beat then humiliate the Anzat mercenary in deplorable ways before the others, the Yokusei ensuring there was no protest.

As Rannek watched the ‘correction’ a deep well of self hatred bubbled in his chest, knowing he was, if not solely responsible for the Foundering, then certainly sharing at least a third of the blame - while economics and soup hunger might’ve pulled many Anzat offworld, the aminopaphage excesses and dangers he had instigated by normalising the once taboo practice created a push factor.

The glory of what had once been the Evokation slipped through his mind, the parades of armoured warriors past the Palaces of Azzheri in the midday sun that softly pushed through the clouds, the banners of a dozen noble, proud Kindes each bearing the mare crest as drums beat tales of victory against the vel.

How short sighted they had been to quarrel among themselves when the galaxy lurked with hungry eyes and soft tasteful brains to consume...they could’ve had an Empire, he was preparing for such, martialing the Kindes, the castes, building new vessels...his Children would inherit such power as had never been seen...

Instead….The Great Sorrow’s black hooks embedded in his thoughts once more.

“By the Voices I did this...I had more power than any Clucir, the Capugio was my puppet and I squandered it all...centuries searching for my Misitia...I…”
….
….
He returned to his present, the collected dregs that called themselves Anzat staring confused at him, the punished one bleeding naked on the floor.

“How long, Efendí…” Rannek whispered regarding his latest slip from reality

“An hour, if it please, Hanshõ,” was the whispered reply.

Rannek nodded and stretched his hand to take water from a patient Lek’un servant girl, her eyes puffy from fear and horror from having witnessed the Fourth Correction.

“Amboniable though you are, you will serve me,” Rannek continued as if no time had passed at all.

“You will not sup until I know the secret of this parable told me by a Nun of the Old Way -

‘Upon the ruin of the Eyeless Seers, where the Man that was Hunger fed, there you will find where your children first bled, the Shinigami there will wait, and by your command bring you to your fate.’”

The assembled Anzat showed the astonishment the Lek’un could not express.  He had used the enormous power of the Yokusei to summon Anzat across the quadrant to solve a riddle.

“Well speak! Or are you dumb as well as impurely born! I will wait no longer for my Misitia,”

Anzat and Lek’un alike stood dumbstruck, incapable of complying with the mad Ancients' wish.

Rannek stared across the line of disgraces once more.

“The Rattan will loosen your tongues, Efendí have them all Corrected to the Third Degree,”

None of the ‘young’ Anzat had any notion of what the Third degree was - whether worse or ‘better’ than the fourth  - and none wished to know.

“Master!” one elderly Anzat in a scholars white and brown robes spoke

“Honoured One, my Lord!…please…we need time to consider the parable…”

“You shall have your time.”

Rannek almost smiled, they didn’t understand - he intended to punish them for what they were regardless.

“After your correction,”

<<<<>>>>

[TheDutchman]

With Rannek off-planet, we see firsthand the power of this Elder Anzat with his absolute control over "lesser" Anzat, dominating them via the Yokusei.  Poor Kazic; amidst his search to resurrect Saani he now needs to fight over the very control of his agency, only JUST able to do so given the fact he'd never participated in giving into his biology and ingesting the Soup.  But as for the other 61, they are but thralls to Rannek's whim...not to mention his insanity.  Therein lies the truth to just how dangerous he is: between moments of lucidity and drowning in the past courtesy of his Force Psychosis, this 13,000 year old Time Abyss is amongst the most powerful of the galaxy's beings.  Just what happens when he finally finds out what happened to his children or, perhaps instead, their legacy?  Will such a revelation completely break his tenuous hold on his sanity or will he simply succumb to the Kuru that even now grips his mind?

Now that the women of Aethas have donned their battlearmor, the road upon which they find themselves seems even more dangerous than they could've even suspected: from a nigh-invulnerable Anzat Elder to the depravations of the incredibly secretive Luka-Sene, Mili&Co must navigate an uncertain future half-blind (at least for them) while following clues that stubbornly resist their best efforts to produce answers.

Interesting connection through the Force, perhaps a mechanic of Flow-Walking or Force Sight but the parallels between Mili, Ari, &Co and Mira, Isas, et al. travel down eerily similar yet divergent paths as they seek the knowledge of the Luka-Sena, learning perhaps for the first time in a LONG time that MIGHT will not get them the objective they so desperately need.  Indeed, the harsh treatment with which BOTH groups are subject to just illustrates that the Luka-Sene is a force to be reckoned with...and perhaps a source of intel that may provide answers.

But until then, Rannek's sphere of influence is only beginning, growing stronger daily.  With his Sonae and the 61 Anzat, I suspect that this campaign will see much more bloodshed before too long...not to mention a collision between the Elder Anzat and our Aethans.

Meta-note: Spectacular world-building here as the threads seem less and less disparate.  And the accompanying renderings look spectacular!  Great stuff here.

...And IS the "Third Degree" of punishment better or worse than the "Fourth"?!?

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 7 - Extractions - Part 1

10555BBY  — Lu’Ka’Selah

The air was thin and steadily rising. 

Overhead wisps of rich yellow wove intricate patterns at solar emissions stripped the atmosphere off. 

Another visitor from his world might observe a similarity to the Silent voice of Anzat.
Rannek had no time or interest in such irrelevances.

It was claimed among the sages and mystics that this was a planet full of Seers and clairvoyants. 

After nearly 2000 years of fruitless searching, the Clucir would leave no potential resource unexploited to find his children.

“Let us see what these Hutt’s have to offer,” Growled Maatek mare-Nyru his loyal Kinju, plated in armour that had long since been worn of any paint or decoartion on the overlapping plates leaving a burnt steel and washed thread colouring, the Gaki helm alone retaining some red around the fangs.

Rannek ignored the error of Maatek, they had not visited a Hutt world for some 50 years. The Clucir was growing ever more used to the slips the Kuru induced in his companions,

Maatek’s slips were not so frequent as to require him to be ‘retired’ - yet.

They were one of the few ships arriving on Lu’Ka’Selah, the homeworld of the Mir’Sen’Luka near human species, varying in skin tone from light ivory to dusky brown, all had, to Ranneks sight, perpetually squinting eyes as if trying to stare at something past the mundanity of the physical world.

He could understand why - though this planet was mere years away from being uninhabitable due to atmospheric degradation, indeed many regions around the poles were devoid of all life, exposed completely to the relentless pulses of the Stars emissions and background radiation beyond, unfiltered by any magnetic repulsion - it was still rich with Anima, Magicka - or as the Gaijin more often called it, the Force.

Small teardrop vessels made round trips ferrying goods and people off the planet to larger bulbous vessels headed to some unknown colony world further into the rims, braving the Pirate empires that led nomadic existences occupying one planet then another before moving onto to loot and conquer again.

Rannek had encountered far too many of the Raider-Lords of late, an engagement off Duro depleting his forces he was forced to return to Anzat prime for more Lek’un, his journey further delayed as he was forced to put down an uprising in the Sabaku on his return.

Striding through the largely abandoned town built into an island at the far western side of vast lake in the midst of a mountain range, likely created by an ancient meteor impact and filled by rains down the grassy mountain sides when the planet still had a functioning weather system before the merciless sun stripped it of all fecundity.

The Mountains now were covered in yellow dead grasses, the lake a stinking foetid swamp slowly evaporating off, the retch worthy stench of dead organisms wafting off in green waves to the skies.

Death seemed to greet him everywhere in the Nightmare of his existence.

When he could sleep he dreamt of placing his Tremor-sword into his Son’s strong arms, then running his fingers through his daughters mist like hair…yet he woke always to the same nightmare - the Great Sorrow of their absence.

Such introspection did not assist him, he approached the gaudily clad seers ahead, their obnoxiously coloured robes over silver armours.

“Travell’or Arr’ival For’Tell, Seers Witness Petition,” The most colourfully dressed of the guard spoke as they stopped before the last seeming occupied building, circular with a large dome on flowing white columns  supported a wide portico into a black whorl of a rounded doorway.

Indifferent to their permission Rannek and his Gaki walked forward pushing the blackened door open, the reliefs carved more in the Force than the Onyx ignored by the Anzat as mere curiosities of uncouth Gaijin art.

Within was a vast Chamber under a process of deconstruction.  Internal walls had been removed, cranes, hoists and scaffolds were in place with more of the Mira-Sene-Luka working upon them pulling off large slabs of the interior walls that appeared made of some kind of multi-spectral crystal.

This world was being stripped of anything of worth before its Star ended it completely.

In the center of the room were two figures, male and female handsome so far as humans could be, pale skinned in black and white robes. behind them large beds chiselled in carefully placed balcony nooks in the wall in which seemingly sleeping Mira-Sene-Luka were having fitful nightmares.

“What is this perversion…” Maatek grunted his slab like features criss crossed with battle scars, the scent of Lek’un brain fluids on his breath.

“Seers of the Mira-Sene-Luka, If you truly are what the stories claim, you know who I am and why I have come!” Rannek boomed his still full hair swept back into a topknot.

“We See Thee Soul Eater,” the two black and white clad beings, male and female spoke in unison, the lack of hair on either made both look like chattel stripped ready for the sale yards.

“And We see the Children you seek,”

“Then where are they!” His voice trembled with the power of a thousand consumed souls, the workers nearby cowering as their scaffolds shook.
“Lead me to them and the wealth of the Evokation, Gold, Slaves, Silks, will be yours,”

“The Ghosts of your Sins have taken them from you, to the Blackest Abyss into which Vision is blind to us - Our Own Future.”

“Senseless riddles,” Maatek sneered
“Let us consume them, that will yield as much,”

The Ter-Sene of the era were reaching a branching point. They would be split between the two colonies Sona-Ale’ph and Sona-Kat’ahh making their Vision fractured.

Yet always in motion was the future, there was a real chance the Anzat might attack.  Distressed and fleeing there would be little resistance to the hardened veterans of 3000 years of war across Anzat Prime.

“I’ve no time for this foolishness, speak plainly this filthy Gaijin tongue already befouls my lips!” Rannek yelled back.

“You shall see your offspring, yet by foot you must walk to them across Times fabric,” the So and Sa Sene replied with what little information they could interpret from the Ter-Sene, hoping it was enough.

Rannek’s scowl twitched in time to his flexing finger on the hilt of his sword, contemplating slaying them all for their obtuse ramblings.

“I give you one last chance…” Rannek growled, his Kinju eyeing the positions of the small number of guards, the workers quickly shuffling away as the Force rippled with his displeasure.

“...if you know where they are tell me now and be rewarded, prevaricate again and you will be punished,”

“Other than that you will see them once more we know not, the dark threads of our own Future are intertwined, the forset through which our Vision can never see,” the twin voices replied from the Sa and So Sene as their eyes glanced at Maatek who was pacing around them at a respectable but slowly closing distance.

“They’re lying,” the Kinju hissed
“They either know nothing and enjoy trifling with us…or they know something…”

“I will drink the truth of it,” Rannek decided and with a flick of his finger unleashed his warriors.

The Lukata-Sentai, antecedents of the Luka Sene were swift to react, armour with Crys plate and wielding Psionic weapons, both bulky and ungainly compared to latter era’s, but not less effective.

The Gaki, forged by decades of war across Anzat Prime and on their Lords journeys across newly charted hyperspace lanes seeking his Children were swifter.

Psi-charged bolts missed all but one of their mark as the physically superior Anzat swept at the Lukata -Sentai with ravenous open mouths curious to experience this Anima strong races soup - Hallowed Psionic Halberds clashed swiftly against Sabaku Steel Tremor swords hand crafted by Master Lek’un, pulsing screeching drawls through the air.

Tanto and Shuriken grazed off Crystalline armour with a glass breaking shriek, Psi-daggers heated folded Ō-yoroi plates.

Rannke left the fighting to his Kinju, striking forward at the So and Sa Sene, the Lukata–Sentai Xowl intercepting him with a Psi-Sword, the Anzat pivoting to avoid the stroke with ease. 

The Xowl thrust three more times, Rannek, considering the style clumsy and blunt compared to the Blademasters of Anzat prime, did not even draw his blade, only at last deigning to back hand the Xowls Crystalline helm, cracking it into her weather face, shards lodging in her wan eyes.

Still the Xowl fought as if nothing had happened, the loss of physical sight not a great difficulty for the increasingly non-visual Miralukan ancestors.  Relenting to the inevitable Rannek gripped his blade as he sidestepped a Force powered strike, drawing his blade in and through the Xowl’s arm at the elbow, following through with a quick flip round to cut into her thigh join between glass like plates.

Falling he caught her in a tight embrace, face to face she stared confused then bloody eyes widened as his proboscis delved into her.

Savoury and thick the taste was not unpleasant on the surface, but the grief for the loss of their dying homeworld gave it a sour note as he imbibed her essence into his own, feeling his Anima grow by another small fraction as some small part of her connection to the Force was appended to his own.

She slid off trailing blood from her unnaturally stretched nostrils, his Kinju likewise supping on those they took alive, only a few moderate injuries sustained. 

All this occured in the space of seconds, the Sa and So Sene scrambling round the edge of the Seers caskets to a secret exit.  With an annoyed flicker of his anima Rannek grabbed the woman in the white robe with his mind dragging her toward him, her nails clawing at the Kyber floor.

Anzat strength lifted the So Sene as easily as a porcelain doll to Rannek’s still hungry proboscis that shattered into her nostrils, jetting blood out as he supper her.

A cacophonic bluster of the 23 Voices of the Ter-Sene pushed against him, even with 2000 years of Anima he could not breach through the mental gravitas to pluck any memories of use - only feel the utter helplessness of the petty Seers afraid they would die along with their decaying world.

Ripping his face free from his victim, Rannek experienced the sickly cold stilted discomfort of a disrupted feeding as the sky groaned and ground quaked with another athenosphere tremor induced by the gravitational instability of the nearby star alternately gripping then releasing its hold on the semi-solid heated interior.

The planet had little time left, the Anzat no desire witness it’s atmosphere finally sheared off.

“There is nothing here, we leave,” he cursed spitting on the Sa Sene as the bald black robed humanoid wept over his dead partner.

With rapacious bloody feedings and indifferent crushing murders the Anzat left, the Ter Sene conclave bitter and resolved never to allow such an affront again. 

Few Sene had died all told, but the So-Sene…one of only two women who bore the chemical and Force genetic heritage that granted the So and Sa Sene their gifts of interpreting the Conclaves group mind…was a loss the Ter Sene had not foreseen…

It’s consequences would haunt them on their new colony worlds.
 

<<<<>>>>

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 7 - Extractions - Part 2

497 BBY / 3947BBY — Alpheridies — Extortion

Mira and Atris sat in the utter pitch dark on a cold bench not knowing if the cell was large, small - lighting superfluous to the eyeless Miraluka - the Force, while present ‘ended’ at the walls, a bubble cut off from the rest of the Cosmic and Life Energies.

Closing her eyes Mira reached out with the Force, trying to ‘see’ as Visas and Meetra had shown her to detect something. There was Isas, a dull grey rather than blue with frustration, Varasian and Alixa a mix of grey and a bloody red, primal rather than dark…and then there was the heartless white of Atris.

The former Jedi master also focused on her other senses with Jedi techniques of observation, reflecting on the exact words of the So and Sa Sene.

There was an undercurrent to it all, something more than just trying to stop Isas goal of revising, in a new form, the culture of Katarr.

“It’s a stitch up,” Mira whispered to her nominal ‘ally’ seating herself beside her after a cautious wobbly walk.
“Those Seers don’t want to stop Isas, they want something from her…”

“Yet what can a woman who creates ‘abominations’ have to offer them?” Atris wondered

Ari and Lyaea sat upon the same bench, Kiraea pacing the same path as Alixa, Varasian and Xanaea running fingers over the same thin braille lines on the wall, Milaea near the door, like Isas staring outward wondering why the Ter-Sene would take such an uncharacteristically interventionist approach.

They would not have to wait long, in 98 minutes their check in with Aethas was due - without any contact Evaea and the Extolled on the Aephroadea would sound the warning via Villip, within an hour the Verndari - six 3.5 meter tall revenant Aethans of the Technocracy era led by the single minded Ninth and 30 Extolled warriors would be on their way to liberate them with the Aethanea and Persephaea.

A small force, but the ruthless Verndari and suicidally vicious Extolled would inflict immense damage on civilian targets in very short periods of time having no compunction in using their arsenal of Naquxium and Vong-biological weapons from orbit. Even if the Luka Sene could respond against the Verndari the Force blank Vong weapons and ships, utterly invisible to Miraluka who relied on the Force so heavily, would prove a devastating surprise.

The doorway opened to admit the Amide-Sene-Touh Lenns Dahn in Milaea’s time and Senb Touv in Isas’, the administrative leader of the Miraluka flanked by Sene-Xowl.

“Remanded,” both said thousands of years apart
“Until Circumstances Ter-Sene Vision warns imperill Sene-Luka pass uneventful,”

“It must be a circumstance of great benefit to our cause if the Seers fear our presence there so much they would inter us,” Atris noted, understanding more, the Ter-Sene wished to ensure whatever critical moment they had foreseen did not occur.

“You don’t have that long,” Milaea replied firmly
“In less than two hours our People will send a force to retrieve us, if they can’t this world will suffer immensely until they do,” her tone was increasingly clipped and bitter, Ari recognised it as Milaea’s normally abundant patience wearing thin.

The  Amide-Sene-Touh shifted uncomfortably, the eight colours of his robe scrunching visible to her Aether sight as he folded his arms defensively.

“Communication possible, Avert,” Lenns Dahn replied as if seeking a solution - something was clearly not right about this situation, the Amide-Sene-Touh seemed embarrassed by it, following instructions from the Ter-sene he did not agree with.

“We’ll tell them to bring twice the soldiers,” Kiraea verbally jabbed at him, pouncing on the scent of fear, something absent in his predecessor Senb Touv.

“You’re exceeding your authority by holding offworlders indefinitely,” Isas noted, well aware of the limits of the Administrative rulers power, her father having been one - the whole situation seemed forced and strange.
 
“Ter-Sene Command, Amide-Sene-Touh and Luka-Sene Implement,” was his rebuff.

“Nourishment forthcoming,” Touv said dismissively before leaving.
Lenns demured
“Agreement to avoid escalation,” he offered

“No negotiation,” Ari added stepping up beside Milaea, all the Aethan women now in a row before him to show a unified front, in the Aether if not visually.
“Release us now or suffer the consequences,”

“Counsel I will seek,” Lenns said with a bow before scuttling out the door clanking with a heavy lock behind him as if to contain the damage it the dark cell.

“How long before the real puppet masters show up?” Mira and Lyaea asked.

“Not very, they know we are not bluffing,” Ari replied irritation unconcealed in her voice.

The sense of urgency was transmitted across time. 

Twenty minutes later as the Amide-Sene-Touh waited for an audience with the Ter-Sene, a secret door slid open at the back of the cell from what appeared a seamless block of the natural granite from the valley, admitting two figures in plain Black and white robes - the So and Sa Sene.

“I knew there was something off about those freaks,” Mira whispered to Atris
“You sneaky kreslugs,” Kiraea snapped at them.

“Time is short, proposal,” the inbred twins spoke alternating words, Isas, her children and the Aethans quickly realising the twins were not simply parroting the words of the Ter-Sene anymore.

“You’re not just mouth pieces of the seers are you,” Ari noted
“Your Freedom, expedited, in exchange, we require items of sustainment.”
“What items,” Isas and Milaea asked.

“Your Vision True, excessive consanguinity a weakness to So and Sa Sene, revitalization required. Luka-Sene, Ter-Sene, unable to countenance modification required,”

Understanding dawned on both trapped parties, the So and Sa Sene needed what the Aethans and Isas had, and the Miraluka of Alepheridies despised.

“You need fresh blood, genetic rejuvenation,”
“Temporary measure for sustainment…” the So and Sa Sene replied, well aware that their request of Isas bought them only time, 70 generations later in Milaea’s day the consequences of inbreeding had caught up to them once more.

Mira laughed aloud “This whole thing is just a stick up! Blackmail, we never spoke to the ‘23 Seers of the Miraluka’ did we, or only what you pallid faced freaks allowed us to hear,”

“They think you’re just mouth pieces…if you asked them direct you’d give the game away…,” Lyaea noted “Clever,”

“What exactly do you want?” Isas and Ari asked

Here the response of the Speakers differed according to their needs between times.
“Unique gametes,” they requested first of Isas
“Regeneration according to your ability,” the second of Ari,

“That is frelling gross,” Mira said, nearly gagging on the thought, then realizing it was slightly less disgusting than what they had no doubt been doing to lead to such a recessive state.

“Male or Female” Isas less squeamish asked
“Both,”

“We can’t heal other species,” Milaea cautioned “Only transform them to become more like us,”
“Sufficient,”

“We will need time and equipment, and more than just ‘freedom’ in exchange for agreeing to this farce,”

“Our powers are limited at the moment, but you know that, and we will want more than just ‘freedom’ and the location of Katarr.”

Isas then Ari bargained

“Explain”

“You will claim the Ter-Sene has Vision that all those of Katarr heritage should join my colony,” was Isas demand

“The location of Katarr, Luka Sene equipment -Psionic weapons, Crys armour and associated blueprints and designs, and copies of anything we consider valuable among your collections of prophecies and texts to be collected at our convenience.”  was Ari’s

“Consideration given” the So and Sa Sene said before quickly departing leaving both groups with much to contemplate.

<<<<>>>>

“OK I get these freaks need to keep the fact they aren’t just mouth pieces a secret, it’s very obvious they need some fresh genes…but why don’t they just declare the Seers told ‘em to hook up power couplings with someone here?” Mira asked, messily eating in the pitch dark from the bowls of thick gruel provided.

“That is their true secret,” Isas replied
“My father, Jaran Marr was Amide-Sene-Touh of Katarr, he knew the Speakers did not always transmit the will of the Ter-Sene verbatim.  He also knew the heritage that allows them alone to comprehend the will of the Seers is not so pure as they would have others believe.

Their ancestry harkens back to a time before we lost our electromagnetic eyesight, and our original birth world - but that was thousands of years ago.  To sustain their bloodlines without complete collapse they need occasional infusions, but only of a particular sort…you noticed their vestigial eyes…”

“Hybrids…” Atris deduced “Something the Luka Sene of Alpheridies would never believe was the true Will of the Seers to demand, exposing the speakers”

“Correct,” Isas confirmed
“No doubt the Amide-Sene-Touh is aware, but his power is limited, hybrids are rare, even my own children were not naturally conceived, fewer still would ever donate to help the So and Sa Sene maintain their hereditary stranglehold on the Ter-Sene.”

“Never thought of the Miraluka as having grimy brother-sister hookups at their heart…” Mira added

“I will not force you,” Isas said, turning to Alixa and Varasian, the only ones who could provide the genetic material needed, the Katas family would never agree after their treatment.

“If this is the fastest way out,” Varasian resolved, turning to Alixa,
“And gives us something to hold over the Speakers if we ever need them again,” Alixa resolved as always seeking advantage for her People

“I sincerely hope never to return here,” Isas mulled.

<<<<>>>>

“Can we even do it without killing them?” Lyaea asked

“Would that be a bad thing?” Kiraea giggled

“A small amount of shatterpoint healing, half an hour, maybe less,” Xanaea considered, her expertise in healing arts, traditional and conventional more in depth, and her innate curiosity making the chance to ‘experiment’ on the speakers appealing

“But Lya’s right, they are already so wretched, we would have to be very careful,”

“With the Shadow there is little else we can be…” Ari noted

“It seems strange though,” Lyaea went on

“With all the Luka Sene here, and Jedi on Coruscant, Singers on M’Tzigon, who would love to have the Luka-Sene owe them one -  why would they need us to help them specifically? Especially risking so much.”

“They know something we don’t,” Kiraea sniffed “And they won’t tell us…unless we make them,”

“And we will make them,” Milaea finally spoke with cold unforgiving tones, they had come here peacefully for help from their ancestral species, and been dragged into the machinations of the So and Sa Sene instead.

Moments later the secret door slid open again, a slight light illuminating the utter darkness in both times.

“Agreed” the Black and white robed twins announced.

<<<<>>>>

“Shielded from Ter-Sene,” The So and Sa Sene explained after following them through winding narrow passages within the thick walls of the Adytum to a clinical icy room of harsh sanitized metals and thick scent of bleach.

“For our recovery after Communing and health care…”

Isas, Varasian and Alixa in one time, Milaea, Xanaea and Kiraea in the other, whilst Artis, Mira, Ari and Lyaea waited in the Adytum Archive to receive their reward and communicate to Aethas there was no need for an ‘intervention’.

“All equipment is here, Our physician may be summoned,”

“No need,” Isas and Milaea insisted
“We know how to perform the operations, simply show us where all the necessary equipment is,”

Isas Marr had worked as a nurse for her husband's fertility business before events demanded she take the mantle exemplified by the tiara she still wore.

The implements all featured Miraluka haptic feedback systems to communicate to the surgeon what they could not see, the sensations transmitted via small electrical pads Isas applied to her eye sockets - the thin sensitive skin there could experience highly acute sensations that were mapped to what the instruments were touching in the patient. 

Learning the patterns took years, and she was somewhat out of practice, but the procedures were not complicated, the routine tasks of sterilisation, insertion, suction and placement in slow cooling containment fields coming back to her swiftly.

That it was performed on her own children was less unnerving than the blind vestigial eyes of the So and Sa Sene watching on.

They didn’t realise what they were truly getting with this ‘donation’, Isas children were more than just hybrids, and while certainly this would buy the Speakers quite a number of generations - if used carefully in their incestuous reproduction - one day they would need more.

A suspicion proven true as Milaea and Xanaea gently slid IV’s into the arms of the pallid, weak Speakers, their flesh was near translucent under the robes, veins thick and purple.

“This will provide raw components with which to build new cells in addition to those we alter…” Xanaea explained forcing herself to adopt a kindly bedside manner despite her disgust of the malformed outsiders.
“...hopefully you will gain some physical resilience as well,”
Kiraea was counting on the fact.

As gametes were taken in one time, energy was given in the next.

Alixa curled her lip as the micro incision was made, Varasian clenching his teeth, all cells harvested directly from inside their bodies to avoid any possible contamination - they could feel nothing and yet experienced everything.

Tingles on Milaea and Xanaea’s fingers lit the air a crimson red as they gently pushed their ‘healing’ onto the Miraluka, instinctively trying to ‘correct’ the vastly erroneous bodies at the most fundamental levels, the infinite precision of the Force allowing hundreds of imperfect DNA sequences to be rewritten at once, the IV bags rapidly draining as the Aethan womens stamina as the Shadow limited even this minor act.

The Sa and So Sene could only take so much, the pressure within Milaea and Xani to change ever more, to do away with the backward double helixes and replace them with quad helixes like their own hard to resist.

In thirteen minutes both operations were complete, thousands of years apart, the Speakers given a temporary stay on their final genetic degradation.

The Sa Sene rose first, skin taking on a pinkish hue - far from healthy but now closer to living than rotten.

“Feeling better?” Kiraea asked, seated on a bench.

“Renewed Invigorated”

“Good…” 
In a flash the Aethan woman grabbed the Sa Sene, Xanaea pinning the So Sene to the gurney, Kiraea pressing a scalpel to the neck at the just visible artery.

“Now you’re going to tell me you white faced dren licker why you needed us, or I will spill your shiny new new blood all over your little sister-wife here then laugh as we turn your cities to glass from orbit,”

As she had in the last few missions seeking survivors that turned into punitive expeditions, Milaea stood by while Kiraea threatened and tormented, taking more pleasure in it than she liked to openly admit. 

Every minute they had spent here was one minute longer her nieces and nephews would spend in a coma.

Milaea would neither forgive nor forget that.

“You…Would…Not”

Kiraea slammed her fist down on the Speakers foot, undoubtedly breaking it causing him to howl.

“The blood lines, strong, dominant traits, a boon at first, countered our recessive ones, but unique, unnatural, twisted…we never sensed the like…until you reached Alpheridies…the Seers knew…told us our Doom was nigh…we refuse our fate…”

“What blood lines?”

“Your Ancestors…gave their seed and eggs, we planted it within ourselves piece by piece to sustain…never knowing until it was too late it left us with less choice than before,”

Xanaea sneered, Milaea shook her head - once more outsiders had tried to use Aethan genetics to benefit themselves - and as with every other attempt doomed themselves.

The promise of Aethan demi-god like physiology blinded outsiders to the costs and complications of using the tainted creations of Soron Varas. 

The ingenious Doctor had created a proprietary system almost completely incompatible with other living things - after all anything not of Varas ingenious design could only be ‘inferior’.

That was why Aethans could not heal lesser beings, only transform them, an internalised specificity that was one of the many sources of their Xenophobia.

“And now you need Us more than we need you…” Kiraea smiled
“Oh you silly little kreslugs…the price just went up,”

<<<<>>>>

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 7 - Extractions - Part 3

When the Amide-Sene-Touh returned an hour after they returned from the sojourn to the So- and Sa Sene’s rooms - both of them appeared more humble.

“Ter Sene confirms the time of danger has passed, you are released,”

With Sene-Xowl escorting the Administrative leader neither party dared to reveal the secret deal done with the Speakers, yet undoubtedly both Amide-Sene-Touh suspected such had occurred. 

The secret of the Sa and So Sene manipulation of the Ter-Sene’s Vision, made possible as they were the only mouthpiece, needed to remain or risk a fundamental breakdown in Miralukan societies trust in their Seers to provide benevolent leadership and guidance.

“Compliance Appreciated,” the Miralukan leader added, not at all meaning it.

<<<<>>>>

“Well that was…weird…” Mira exhaled on the ‘Float’ back, the Luka Sene noticeably absent since the deal with the Speaker had been fulfilled.

“They really didn’t seem to like you two…ironic” she nodded to Varasian and Alixa, the pair seeming quiet since leaving the Adytum.

“They are afraid of what they represent,” Atris noted in her ‘all knowing’ tone
“Something worse than simple dilution of their society into the larger human population of the Republic - an alternative culture that takes the extremes of the Miraluka, without any of the temperances of traditional rules.”

Neither Varasian nor Alixa spoke, both staring idly at the floor or wall.

“Hey…” Mira quickly swapped seats to plant herself beside Varasian,
“You two alright?”

“Disappointed,” Varasian replied “I had hoped that we might find welcome, help…kinship even…not…”

Exploitation, confusion, insult, Mira could fill in the gaps for him, unable to help herself feel a tug to comfort him, but she couldn’t let herself be drawn in like that.

“There is no place for us among those Miraluka, nor them among us,” was Alixa’s bitter conclusion, bolting the doors against the last possible ‘outsider’ ally.

“Alpheridies has abandoned us fully,” Isas confirmed, the older woman in her regal tiara standing staring at something only she could see

“We are on our own - their lack of Vision will doom them to stagnancy and decay,” Isas said with not so much bitterness as grim certainty.

A truth that Micha Baal of the Luka-Sene felt millenia later as she gently removed the ancient Star Maps written in a Luminous ink on parchments, visible only in the Force eschewing the normal braille of Miraluka texts. 

These beings that she was to provide the maps to Katarr for were so like them, astonishingly more, and hideously less. Was the inevitable fate of all those who tried, through blending with other species, to sustain the Miraluka’s blood lines and culture?

It felt to Micha as if whatever ancestors these beings had, did not know when to stop in their enhancements and selective breeding - almost the mirror opposite problem the Miraluka of Alpheridies faced.

Best exemplified by the horrific visages of the Sa and So Sene, one could legitimately wonder if Miralukan ‘purity’ was any less a cause for revulsion than unfettered dubious ‘enhancement’.

The ultra cold of the Archive within the Adytum didn’t seem to bother the Aethans at all, even their breath remaining unmisted as they waited in the ‘reading room’ surrounded by glassed off racks of scrolls that Kiraea eyed with unconcealed covetousness.

“This map, location,” the Sene-Xowl said with a nod unfurling the thick imprinted vellum before them.

There remained two Sene-Xowl and seven Sene-Tinh escorting them, further Sene-Ba were collecting documents the ‘Ter-Sene’ had ‘instructed’ be provided to them to ‘help educate the Hybrids on proper use of their unfortunately inherited gifts of prophecy,’

Aresaea quickly began running her fingers over the dimpled map suited to the braille system of the Miraluka texts, more knowledgeable on ancient star maps than anyone else.

“Does it have what we need?” Kiraea asked, eyeing each of the Luka-Sene in turn, as if trying to intimidate them - they made no response but she was certain she made at least some of them feel uncomfortable.

“Yes, the chart is not too old, highly detailed and the galactic drift easily quantifiable for surrounding systems, we should be able to get a lock on the system's star easily, then just drop over the orbital and run on sublights in.”

What interested Ari more were the Aether echoes of the authors - they had included Katarr with a sadness and a sense of warning. 

The historic devastation had a profound effect on the Miraluka on Alpheridies, traumatising them deeply, an echo that could explain much of their subsequent retreat from the galaxy.

It was almost a perfect replication of what had occurred on Aethas in many ways - near annihilations making their species more insular, less trusting, and increasingly vicious toward outsiders.

How similar they were, Ari felt. 

Perhaps it was something even deeper in their common ancestry - the loss of the nameless Miralukan homeworld millenia even before that haunted even their distant Aethan descendants. 

All those losses and trauma’s were etched in their respective DNA and QNA as deeply as the lines in the thin metal sheets that comprised many of their legacy books.

“We’ve no time to waste,” Kiraea added as she scooped up a number of bound scrolls ensuring the People got the absolute most out of the unedifying arrangement with the So and Sa-Sene.

Ari took up the sheets and put any thought of the intergenerational trauma of Miraluka and Aethan behind her - the current and future generations needed her now.

<<<<>>>>

Abyss of Memory

”Fire!” he was screaming as volleys of flash red Las-Arquebus shot through the mottled red and brown Massassi warriors.

One with more civilized features stood at the head of the army of the invading Sith, beside him his Illusion-Mages conjuring falsehoods to confuse the Sonae.  But Lek’un learned quickly, Anzat even faster.

He blinked smoke from his eyes and he was face to face with the half Massassi lord, the hallowed Tremor Blade of Q’Atrox screeching against the Sith Crystalline Force-sword, the black oil of the Siths powers a deep well, stronger with each Anzat he had slain in the invasion.

Rannek smiled wondering what he would taste like.  This Sith had power from his dozens of victims, the Gaki had power from thousands.

Their blades danced, the Clucir of Q’atrox, First Defender of the Evokation, toyed with his enemy, amused at the novelty of the ham fisted aggressive style that lacked the elegance of his own blade work. 

Gliding under a heavy swipe that had the strength to slice off his head, the unkillable Rannek disappointed those in his own ranks who had prayed these Sith were the fabled Shinigami sent at last by the Gods Mercy to end him.

With a deft upward sweep he cut the Sith’s arms off at the elbows, sheathed his sword through the chest plate, then grabbed the sides of the Siths face and drew him into to be supped.

The World spun in the frenetic fear and astonishment, his palate then peppered with rage and deep hate, coursing ambition of a petty lord of a backstabbing kingdom, so much like the Evokation he mused as he fed ever deeper on the memories of a scorched world, a child of a Lord and one of dozens of Massassi concubines brutalized into the hardened lord he had slain…

The face of the child stuck…this wasn’t right, it had moved on to the teen years as Rannek ate the Soup of Memory…its deep black eyes standing from pallid red skin convicted him with a constant question - Why Why Why….

His breathing almost stopped Ranneks eyes opened to the ever familiar image of the Efendí kneeling before him.

“How Long Efendí…” he asked with a dry croak

“Four days if it please Hanshõ,” Druhanne replied, Rannek grunting as the Lek’un brought forth water and thinly sliced Koi-Trout.

“Hanshõ, the impure ones you summoned believe they have discerned the meaning of the Parable you gave them,” Druhanne advised tentatively after such long…meditations…

“I will receive them after my ablutions,” Rannek replied

Those he completed on his own, spurning the Lek’un maids’ assistance, though it took him longer, before entering his audience chamber on the Kitsune. There amidst the Sword Kenin three of the shameful excuses for Anzat awaited him on their knees, foreheads to the floor.

It seemed the ‘corrections’ and Yokusei had at last yielded the respect Rannek was entitled to.

Stammering and still showing the bruises from his correction, one Scholar raised his head from the floor long enough to speak.

“Honoured Clucir…the Parable, the first part ‘Upon the ruin of the Eyeless Seers, where the Man that was Hunger fed we believe refers to a planet known as Katarr. The Eyeless seers are the Miraluka race, the Man that was Hunger a Darth Nihilus, whom nearly 4000 years ago destroyed the colony there, it is said in the Myth that he was an embodiment of the ‘hunger’ of the Dark side of the Force.”

The Scholar paused as Rannek remained silent, even his robes still as death, the banner of the Q’atrox behind him looming as the Clucir reclined on his throne, his Ancient Tremor sword an inch from his fingers.

“As to the rest of the Parable we are not yet certain,”

Rannek did not care, the remainder - “there you will find where your children first bled, the Shinigami there will wait, and by your command bring you to your fate.’” held no mystery for him - it was his long awaited death.

“Efendí, have the pilot set course for Katarr at once,” Rannek ordered.

The Anzat scholar looked troubled

“Mighty Clucir...forgive me but…the location of Katarr has been lost for millennia,”

Rannek rolled his eyes, then gestured a mere two fingers to the Efendí, Druhanne quickly struck the back of the Scholars head with the Rattan for his impudence.

“The only thing forgotten is the utility of Lek’un!” the Clucir snapped “Efendí summon the pilots,” he ordered, Druhnne quickly sending a page boy to fetch them.

“What other names had this world Katarr? Speak!”

“Kar’Tar and in the Miralukan tongue Sona-Kat’ahh,” the Scholar gulped.

The pilots bowed in due deference as they entered

“Pilot, know you the co-rodiatess of the world Katarr, Kar’Tar or Sona-Kat’ahh, speak!” Rannek granted leaning forward

“Hanshõ, we are honoured to serve!” the elder pilot replied, his pale greenskin unsuited to the Kinde Q’atrox regalia he wore, a moment later both pilots eyes rolled slightly back in their heads, the Lek’un drawing on hundreds of generations of genetic memory from a time when Katarr was not lost, and when Lek’un were bred properly to specialise in their chores.

“We do Hanshõ,” the older now replied

Rannek offered a grim nod, once more the Lek’un genetic memory proving its utility, the enforced learning of navigation coordinates by rote over generations bearing fruit, but no solace.

“Pilot,” Rannek continued his voice blackening the room with intent.

“Set course for Katarr, inform me when we reach a suitable waypoint that I might summon more…” he didn’t call them the noble title of Anzat, he could not bear to as he looked at the refuse his species had allowed themselves to become

“...servants,” that was being generous.

“Your will be done Hanshõ!” the pilots echoed, turning swiftly to their duties. 

“Leave,” Rannek added all to depart that he might contemplate in solitude.

So many years, so much blood and frustration…at last…at last he would learn what had become of his beloved Daughter and Son.

<<<<>>>>

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 7 - Extractions - Part 4

12654 BBY — The Lek’Un

The triple layered Transparisteel shuddered against its gold inlay frame as Zhoa’s Gift, a bulky Hyperspace capable vessel, one of only six on Anzat Prime, shuddered into low orbit casting off a trail of the once sacred gases that comprised the Silent Voices of the Anzat sky.

Space travel and science made ever more cherished thoughts of the Heavens so much more myth.

Celeano sat in the right pilot's chair, Q’Atrox Sword Kenin watched over them as they made slow progress to the lower plane of the system.

The majority of the sparse space traffic was comprised of Quan-Jump vessels, able to create a micro Quantum breach and ‘leap’ between points instantaneously. 

Such technology however had two disadvantages, first it was much more dangerous, up to 5 per cent of jumps ended it catastrophic molecular collapse, and secondly its range was limited, barely able to jump to the next Solar System, generator capacity limiting most vessels to 4 or 5 jumps.

The new, or rather rediscovered, Hyperspace technology, while more limited in the routes it could traverse, was far better at long range travel, completely bypassing the dying network of Quan-Jump Stations. A few hundred years and Quan-Jump vessels would be obsolete.

Once satisfied none of the Jumpers would attempt to hijack Zhoa’s gift the Sword Kenin left the two Lek’un pilots to plot the jump to the Perlimian Trade route before heading coreward.

As Burak, the second Lek’un pilot ran navi computations on the cogitator Celeano pressed a rewired distress button beneath his console sealing the blocky bulkhead door to the rest of the vessel behind them.

“I have detected an error…” Burak noted “It seems the Z axis is inverted, this will take us away from the trade ro…”

The green skinned Bruak went bug eyed, hands grasping round the needle now pointing out of his throat a small trail of blood mixed with neuro-toxin trickling onto his Q’atrox emblazoned flight suit.

Celeano calmly stood and holstered the dart gun he had carefully brought in - piece by piece, over the months during routine maintenance under the Sword Kenins gaze among his tools then quickly reassembled this very hour, the final component, the neurotoxin, supplied by Fallyn at the last minute in his freshly pressed flight suit.

He caught Burak before he fell and dragged the body behind the chair.

Burak had been completely correct, the jump would take them far from the Trade Route, straight to the Dark Wells, a group of Black holes near a sector known as Kess’ial, also known as the ‘Maw’.

His breathing was utterly calm as he drew on the memories of his ancestors and pledge of the Nectrin Garden Oath with his triplet brothers.

Reaching over he pressed both levers forward to enter hyperspace.

As the whorl of blue surrounded the vessel he began reassembling the second of his secrets, the micro-burst transmitter tuned to his Brother Kullat’s.  The eldest of the Triplets had ventured first to seek a path to fulfil their Oath in such a way that the Gaki filth would be denied any possibility of preventing it.

The comm device remained inoperative, it would be for a long time.

He waited patiently as the ship ploughed hyperspace, the Sínã  and Sine in their apartments excitedly planning their adventures outside of what they had promised their Father they would do, until he was certain none of the Sword Kenin would check on him.

Carefully Celeano opened the Acacia panels to the left where two atomic clocks were located, the polished panels gently placed on the floor beside the stiffening Burak.

The long digital face showed two differing figures, for one clock was kept in a Gravity-Seal isolation field, thus maintaining Anzati ‘Real Time’, the other exposed to the slight warping effects of Hyperspace and Interstellar travel was already behind by a few seconds.

He recalled with perfect clarity the sequence Kallut had Transmitted to him before he began the Long Voyage.

The ship shuddered as it crossed an invisible threshold into the rim of the Maws Gravity well, his eyes darted to the Atomic Clocks as the process began. 

The Shielded Clock began to speed up, now an hour ahead of the Unshielded.

The drives pushed on as he viscerally felt the tug of the Black Holes seeking to unravel the fabric of the ship. 

How much easier to fly the ship into a Star, or at max speed into a rocky moon, but the Oath was clear beneath the Spring sky.

The Nectrin Gardens were replete with peach flowers velvet to the touch, Celeano closed his eyes and delved his Lekku allowing the moment to wash over him fully as the ship buckled and time spun out of reason.

“We Three brothers from this day forward, shall pledge our lives to the fulfillment of our Beloved Hanshõ’s Curse upon the Anathema, the Gaki Rannek-soma MareQ’Atrox - You shall not die till every ghost you have made has had is fill of vengeance upon you.  Silent Voices Harbouring Our Ancestors in the Great Sea of Souls Bear Witness, and cast our Souls to the Depths of the Bleak Ocean should we ever waver,”

They had sliced their hands with the broken Tremor Sword of their true Hanshõ’, plucked from the Ruins of his stormhold decades before the triplets birth, they three the great grand children of, Obdullah, the Last Efendí of the Kinde, their Banu’s - Ancestors - memories and devotion their own, treasured within their Lekku.

No suicidal crash was enough for the Anathema, he must suffer beyond sanity.

And so it was Kullat, hearing of temporal anomalies experienced by specie runners, had devised the means to use the Time Dilation effect of the gravity bending Maw black holes to push the Children of the Anathema over 8000 thousand years into the future, a year after Kullat’s intended exit day. 

There they hoped Kullat would obtain whatever most horrendous new weapons and technology of torture existed in the future to use upon the Anathema’s spawn.

At the very least the Sina and Sine would be trapped an infinite distance from their home.

The Anathema would sense by his Anima the death of his children were Celeano to crash the vessel into a star - their deaths would cause the Anathema to rave yes but ultimately he would endure.

But to kidnap his children, hide them in the far future, that would cause the Anathema centuries of torment denying any form of resolution a known death might bring.

So deeply did Rannek love his Misíta, the Brothers knew the Culcir would ruin his Kinde searching for her, rage and bluster in utter indolence, and die Mad of the Kuru never knowing what became of her - that was true vengeance they prayed was worthy of the Beloved Hanshõ’s curse, honouring their ancestors Obdulla’s Spirit.

Celeano opened his eyes to see the Unshielded clock had barely moved a minute - the shielded however showed nearly two Millennia had passed.

With the precision his race was valued so highly for he began the delicate maneuver out of the Gravity well, the ships engines groaning with effort. His calculations were precise to the gram, nano second and millimeter to ensure he arrived at the time Kallut had given.

When apprised of the plan Kallut had told them the time lap he intended, 8888.888 the most auspicious of numbers should be the leap forward.

Celeano had one eye on the consoles, one on the two clocks digits.

They were already victorious, Oaths fulfilled, each had played their part, Kullat had taken the stride into the unknown, planned the kidnapping, Fallyn had sacrificed his flesh to access and influence the Enfanta to lure her out, and Celeano had the piloting skill and position in the Kinde to snap the bladed jaws shut. 

Finally the gravity alerts died down, he heard the banging on the door as the Sword Kenin tried to enter. 

He had very little time.

“Ancestors Please,” he pleaded as the disparity between the flickering digits on the clocks slowed and they re-entered Galactic Standard Temporal progression, the final variance to the shielded digits was 8889.565, roughly a year and  half after the target - though he well knew the nature of such a device was anything but precise when subjected to such enormous gravity distortions - he could be millennia once side of the other -  but he knew Kullat would do everything in his power to be ready.

There was nothing on sensors, no ship awaiting them, for all he knew Kullat may already be dead, who knew what horrors existed in this time!

May they come for the Spawn of the Anathema! he gleefully invoked his Ancestors.

Then the Miracle.

His Micro-burst Transmitter pinged a gentle chime against the now vicious chainsaw like cranks against the door.

Celeano’s eyes were heavy with tears, his chest beating furiously as he saw a string of numbers on the digital screen of the transmitter that must be navigation coordinates.

As quickly as he could he entered them, disabling the overrides as the Astro-cogitators plotted a course.

The Bulkhead burst open, the Sword Kenin moved swiftly as Celeano himself - the Lek’un tore the underside of the consoles open, ripping out the wires and circuits with his bare hands, his arms quickly blistering with electrical burns.

He struggled for nearly thirty seconds as the Sword Kenin dragged him out, inadvertently damaging more of the wires that linked the controls to the drives, ruining any chance of preventing the Hyperspace jump.

Celeano bellowed with gleeful laughter as the Kenin rammed his face to the ground, the dark of the Maw replaced by the white of a Hyperspace tunnel.

<<<<>>>>

[TheDutchman]

And so now we see the effects of Rannek's desperate obsession, the inviolate need to find his beloved children, the one thing--the ONLY thing--to bring him peace in his life, one especially poignant given both the enormous extent of his prolonged existence but also that his offspring are/were the Hope and Light of a wasted life of indulgence, apathy, and betrayal.

Flying like an arrow into the future, Rannek's decision to cull the So and Sa Sene has more than merely far-reaching implications for the proto-Miriluka, indeed the fate of Mira's Group as well as Mili's is directly tied to the Luka-Sene long road towards deterioration and quasi-renewal (the first all-but-temporary, the second something more permanent yet altogether different).  Was it their Vision that led the Luka-Sene or instead does it blind them from the Changed Future that they themselves cannot correctly discern?  Can it be the Will of the Force...or is this merely another "effect" of Rannek's insane fixation?

Regardless, the metaphysical questions are moot for our Aethans: the Tribe is threatened, the danger real, the consequences dire, and the solution at least hinted towards a particular location, much like a compass cannot show a destination but rather a way to get there.  Furthermore, the actuality of the matter has resulted in Mili hardening her heart, giving into her People's xenophobia and intransigence, something that we know can result in a much, MUCH darker future than what the "galaxy far, far away" has recorded.  One wonders if Mili's descent will have even worse and far lasting repercussions, even IF the Shadow is taking care of and her children healed...

Now we finally see the Triplets' plan executed, their fidelity to their True Hanshõ and Lord the impetus for such drastic matters, their actions quid pro quo for the atrocities paid to the lost children of their Banu's Kinde.  It is precisely this act that serves as Dante's contrapasso, apropos sentiments given Rannek's crimes...and punishment befitting them.

...But will the arrow that was shot in the past hit its target in the future, or will it instead be the harbinger for something even more sinister?

Meta-note: Excellent weaving together of the disparate threads here, the realization of the Triplet's plan as well as their true pedigree 

As always, the attendant pics are perfect, adding to the ambience of the scene^^ 

Brilliant work, LSG 

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 8 - Collisions - Part 1

497 BBY — Katarr

Whatever echoes of the screams of the Devastation of Katarr had once been present were long since faded to barely a whisper that the Blackstone Hull of the Aephrodaea cut in half again.

Through the view screen Milaea looked on the curving surface as it grew with their approach, blinking away a strange after image of a verdant world of blue seas and yellow mountains to the reality of a barren grey and brown pitted sphere.

At first she thought it unconscious Flow-Sight, yet the Shadow in the Aether meant that was impossible - this was a memory of something she had never seen intruding on her present.

“I see it too,” Ari said coming beside her as Lyaea, Xani and Kiraea each occupied the three main command chairs on the triangular bridge whose focal point was the large view screen, data on the planets atmospheric composition, magnetisation, radiation profiles and gravity scrolling past from the auto-scans.

Unsurprisingly there were no detectable signs of active technology or energy sources.

“It’s like remembering a dream,” Milaea added as they ship decelerated, cloaking systems still fully online, the world might be dead, but that didn’t mean it was without danger.

“I feel like I’ve been here before, felt the earth under my feet…and…” Ari paused trying to articulate the grim sensation.

“And we saw it die…” Milaea finished for her

The sensation was unnerving, the implication that within them was somehow a memory of a Devastation nearly 4000 years before that of Aethas troubling.

With a final deep breath Milaea straightened, rolling her shoulders feeling the comforting weight of her Bloodstone armour.

Even if the Shadow in the Aether denied her the expansive boost to her Aether connection it’s enchantments usually provided, she would be well protected from virtually any known physical danger.

“The answers are on that planet,” she said with utter certainty

“if Abominations step upon the Dead World, in blood shall ancestors meet” Ari repeated the Ter-Sene words
“We will find what we need here,”

“But not what we want,” was Milaea’s dark final word before they headed to the Transport Evaea was prepping.

<<<<>>>>

Their Aetheric senses dulled but the Shadow, and Katarr barely holding a whisper of the Aether after so many years a lifeless unvisited rock they flew to the largest, and only still semi visible, settlement. 

Built along the sides and plain of a rock valley, virtually every structure of any height was now lying fallen on the ground covered in a thick layer of dirt, crusty patina over faded murals and carvings, mouldy wetness seeping up from the ground as a river, likely once diverted, had established its course through what was once the main plaza’s and open spaces creating a murky swamp of ankle high water, old pavement beneath slowly accumulating silts. 

Milaea, Ari, Kiraea and Lyaea walked in a wide search pattern, eight of their Extolled retinue led by Evaea prowling the edges and upper levels sniffing for any threat to their Avatars while Xanaea remained on the Aephrodaea providing orbital scans and as a back up in case of intrusion or conflict..

From Ari’s archaeological kit they released two spherical scanner droids. 

“Doesn’t look like anyone has been here for centuries,” Ari explained after half an hour and halfway into the city.

“If the tomb was hidden it could take years to find without the aether,”

The Ter-Sene were certain they would find what they needed here, but the twisted Choir of Seers notion of time was fluid at best, a day or a thousand years likely held no differential to the unbroken chain of the Conclave Group Mind.

An hour in they had reached what seemed to be a central plaza, granite tiles under swampy waters, decayed fountains, administrative buildings mouldy and moss covered, edges dulled to rounded curves by erosion.

Perhaps most troubling was the utter lack of anything living. No moss or algae, nor even micro-orgnaisms.  The Devastation of Katarr had been complete to the point the Aether was utterly absent apart from a thin aura around themselves….and yet…

Yet with each glance their vision flickered to an image of the same features upright and bright at their apogee, the ghosts of beings walking among them, dressed in the multi-coloured shawls and robes the Miraluka favoured - bright spots at the periphery of their vision, images that vanished each time the Aethan women tried to catch them.

Without the Aether, these could only be memories within the women themselves, how and why they possessed these a question that buried itself ever more uncomfortably deep in their minds.

One incongruous object stood out - remains of an old ship in what had once been a botanical park, now a muddy wasteland, it appeared to have crashed, the scar it left in the ground just visible beneath foetid water.

“Never seen a ship like that before,” Lyaea noted as she headed over to it, scrutinising what few outward details remained, it seemed of opulent manufacture, and certainly old but somehow too old.

“A relic vessel?,” Ari said, it was incongruent with the aesthetics of the rest of Katarr they had seen.

“Perhaps they crashed after the Devastation here…”

As she stared more she saw an after image of the vessel in its prime, glistening and perfected by craftsmen bred for that purpose…a symbol of status and expertise fitting for the most powerful….

“Another of those flashes,” Lya guessed correctly, somewhat unnerved by the growing frequency.

They went deeper into the bare ruin that was once a verdant playground, a vast expanse of nature on the fringe of the city.

After images plagued them all, growing stronger the deeper they went, the ghosts of the Miraluka at play, rest and celebration.

“This must be the place,” Milaea deduced “These…memories…are coming stronger and stronger…”

Bleak and featureless in the now, they trudged mud and dust filled air toward the one remaining  landmark - atop a gently sloping hill was an assembly of large rectangular slabs in concentric circles.

Stepping across some invisible threshold Ari nearly doubled over.

The Weight of the Shadow in the Aether seemed to double with her foot fall, the blackness deepening.

Lya about to catch her faltered as she felt it as well, Kiraea and Milaea too.

“The Shadow…” Ari gasped even as she pressed forward.  “...is this the source…” she took another step helped by Kiraea the others headed toward her.

“Secure this area!” Evaea called to the Extolled, the Yuuzhan Vong ghola’s, regrown versions of the first that had called the Aethans Avatars with duplicated memories, rapidly obeyed their Sacred masters who had given them a touch of immortality at the unseen price of effective slavery.

“I’ll stay here with Eva,” Lya added, there was no immediate danger, but they would take no risks by committing all their forces on any one search area.

Ari nodded as she pressed forward, Kiraea and Milaea just behind, the Shadow didn’t increase further with each step, but it was now at a critical level, she could barely lift a rock with what Aether energy was left to her.

She looked carefully at the large slabs, noting faded paints on the front of them, and whilst the surface was flat, they were not single pieces, but carefully assembled conglomerations of varied colours of natural rock, age having faded and blended them together.

“I think these are caskets of some kind…no words as the Miraluka are not visual…but they would’ve had paints, and the stone work energised with the Force so they could ‘feel’ who the occupant was…”

Each step forward was becoming harder, but at the farthest to the circles her superhuman eyesight and impeccable sense of mass scried one Stone Casket that stood out, being of a slightly greater mass than the others and ever so slightly less eroded.  It had been built about 60 years after the next oldest.

“That one…” 

The three Aethans stepped forward, Ari repotining her scanner droids to sweep over it, their initial scan indicating it was air tight.  The Caskets were all 4 meters long, 2 wide and 1.5 meters high, the scans also fed detail to her HUD that the stone was nearly 40 cm thick all round, whatever was within it should be very well preserved.

Located mostly in the open it wouldn’t be difficult to get on a ship so it could be unsealed in a controlled environment.

She reached out to gingerly touch the casket hoping for just a glimmer of the name to come to her through the ancient Miralukan masonry.

The Shadow in the Aether fell hard and Deep around them.

<<<<>>>>

An unco-ordinated amalgam of random vessels burst into the system, led by the ornate and clunky Kitsune. 

Amidst the lacquered gold inlaid panels, Clucir Rannek-Soma Mare Q’atrox oversaw his Lek’un, while the pathetic excuses for Anzat - now numbering 153 following a Siren call burst of the Yokusei days before - piloted their variegated ships around him, the tethers of Yokusei thick around their souls.

His plate armour smelt of fresh Lavandula, a perfume once added by his daughter, now done in unthinking memory by his servants.

As the stars turned back to pinpricks and the ships glided on sub-lights toward the fourth planet of the system the scent took him backward, to when his children were young in the high walled gardens of the Stormholds new extension, the rich veined marbles mined from the conquered Ovarug lands, brought to his power base on the Hokuriku continent as a witness that He, Rannek, had done what no mare before him, even his father, had -  bringing the Ovarug to heel.

His children had eschewed the trinkets and mechanical toys for the grasses and carefully manicured streams of the garden that emulated the landscape of the upper Shivas continent in miniature.

He watched them as he stood in full plate, then as now, about to enter battle to defend his gains as the Seigniory Discord, true to its name, brought mare against mare fighting over the Ovarug spoils.

Favea stared up to him, her kimono of fine red silks wet up to her knees from play, her violet eyes looking expectantly, yet without fear despite the gnashing maw of the Gaki battle helm he wore into battle.

“You are going father?” she asked, he nodded.  A resigned sadness spread over her face momentarily, then she plucked a handful of Lavender, reaching to squeeze it under his belt

“Then you should go with a favour, like the Kenin of old!” she chirped

He smiled then, an expression his face never seemed to be able to replicate since…since….

“...sho….Hanshõ…”

Rannek blinked, hating the return to reality from his beautiful moments of solipsism.

“How long Efendí,” he growled

“Four hours if it please Hanshõ…we have arrived above the planet of the Eyeless Seers, there are no other vessels,”

Regaining his full sense of the now he expanded his mind to seek any hidden creatures, his Anima a black storm cloud that obscured the stars that once seemed so heavenly from below, until travel and knowledge made them just another soiled battlefield.

“Then your observational devices are faulty, I sense them…” he drove deeper at the creatures he sensed, a handful were on the planet, one in orbit.

“Hanshõ, are you certain you…” 

Rannek glared Druhanne down.

“Pilot set your heading to 338-192, there is a being there…” he focused solely on the lone one, it was…familiar yet…distant…

On the Aephrodaea the Shadow in the Aether closed in around Xanaea, the Anima of the Ancient Anzat choking her.

There Rannek felt it, the yielding softness of a mind…
Submit

“Hanshõ there is no vessel on any of our ship's scanners…”

Xanaea fell forward, loose crimson hair falling over her face, skull aching as her fingers gripped the console, the Chiss style controls blue lights becoming blinding beacons piercing into her eyes.  Resistance impossible against the inundation, a flood of power beyond reckoning from an Aether presence that was larger as a HyperGiant Star.

Reveal Yourself

Teeth chattering, her hand moving of its own accord, Xani pulled the glistening platinum plated lever down, a string of lights beside it falling to black as the Stygium Cloaking field was deactivated.

“There,” Rannek declared as the de-cloaked ship appeared on their scanners, the plates of his armour clanking with stern resolve as he stood.
“Comis, have the Sonae secure the vessel,”

“It will be done Hanshõ,” the Comis bowed   

“I will descend to the surface, with the rabble,” Rannek decided.

<<<<>>>>

Lya held her head, in one hand, the comm in the other
“Xani? Xani?”

The Shadow had intensified exponentially for a handful of seconds then receded back.

Now she could not raise Xanaea.

“Yhum III, contact the others,” Lyaea demanded of her Extolled Retinue leader, the third ghola to bear the title Yhum. If conventional and aether comms didn’t work, the Yuuzhan Vong villips were a redundancy virtually no entity in the galaxy could interfere with.

After a few brief moments speaking to a leathery miniature of Ghosk II, Yhum called to her, his ritually scarred face showing genuine concern, his amphistaff creeping over voduun crab armour hissing out the anger he would not show till battle was upon him. 

“The Avatar Xanaea is unwell…Ghosk II had detected vessels attempting to board,”

Xani was alone with only six Extolled on the ship, nowhere near enough to repel a concerted effort…but then why was the cloak deactivated in the first place?

A crack in the clouds signalled a more immediate threat. 

“Six…no seven ships…all headed this way…” she whispered, her face twitching from the Shadow’s pressure that grew as the vessels closed in.

Grabbing her Hades rifle she felt the satisfying thrumm of the ionization cell charging, hoping it would be enough.

<<<<<>>>>>

The slave races of the Anzat and the Aethans fought bloody and hard through the Aephrodaea.

Rannek’s power ensured Xani had not only downed the cloak, but shields, weapons and opened the hangar doors as well. 

Unable to override an Avatar's system commands, the Extolled Mahuk IV - a particular favoured bodyguard Vong-Ghola they had nearly a dozen copies of -  guarded her fiercely as she crumpled into a submissive ball.

The Sonae felt the resistance of equally fanatical Slave soldiers as soon as they entered in their out of date vessels. 

The two Vong Yarek cannons fired magma balls into the first ships, splitting them apart into heated chunks, a handful of Teppo-gami leaping to the floor to fire back, Thud bugs soon cracking their skulls open.

If The Vong had home ground advantage and more advanced bio-tech, the Sonae had numbers and equal zealotry. For the Lek’un death in the service of the Hanshõ was second only to Full Completion, and after so many years awaiting their Masters awakening they revelled in it.

Comis ÇelÍk would not fail the Hanshõ, this vessel would be secured - on the Fourth effort they finally pushed the Vong back, their laser turrets blasting the Yarek cannons apart as the Bioweapons slowly ‘reloaded’.

“FORWARD!” ÇelÍk demanded of his Yari-Gami, their Vibro-Naginata keen as they rushed into the larger vessel..

The Vong sprang on them from all sides, blorash jelly pinned the Lek’un limbs, Bael Gas rotted their amour, Amphistaffs cut though their chests, but the Lek’un would not be denied, slicing ferociously, frantic to take the life of the Hanshõ’s enemies, the Genetic memory of their Warrior ancestors allowing them to adapt swiftly. 

The First Vong fell to the peerless co-ordination of Las-rifle and Vibro-Naginata, Flame thrower Sonae burning a second to death after cornering him.

Each Vong yelled glory to their Gods as they died, a harsh cry overtaken only by the Oaths of Moment belted by the Sonae to bring glory to the Hanshõ, Kinde Q’atrox and their Banu.

ÇelÍk kicked over the charred corpse noting with some interest the novelty of the creature - but also the utter incongruence between its hideous aesthetic and that of the vessel.

“These beings are servants of the True masters of the vessel,” he informed his subordinate officers.

“Find them,”

<<<<>>>>

“Avatar! Avatar!” Mahuk IV whispered as he pounded through the central maintenance corridor of the Aephrodaea carrying her on his back, the pipes and structural beams still and cold in black metallics that reflected little of the stabbing blue hued lights.

“Wha…what…” the Shadow was still full upon Xani, but it’s icy ‘Gaze’ seemed to have drifted away for the moment.

“Avatar the ship is lost you must flee…they will find us soon,” he stopped beneath the ladder that led to a hatch under the main hangar.

“I will hold them,” his vast form that the voduun crabs ligaments could barely contain turned round, pinprick biot augmented eyes in deep skeletal sockets telescoping to see the pursuing Lek’un raise their carbines and shot-pulvers for close quarters fighting.

Xani began climbing immediately head still foggy from the Shadow’s intense ‘gaze’, sparing no more thought for the Extolled gohla that would sacrifice himself for her than the Clucir did for the Lek’un that would do the same to claim his prize.

Lek’un and Extolled were equally replaceable and disposable tools.

Yet to them service was their very existence.  Shot pulver blasts echoed against the pipes and tight packed dark grey walls, the micro flechettes searing into the voduun crab as Mahuk charged, coufee in each hand, amphistaff round his neck springing out to bite a Lek’un in the neck. 

As three versions of Mahuk had before him, the enormous Extolled thrashed determined to die for his Avatars.

As their ancestors had before them the Lek’un valiantly strove to further their Hanshõ’s glory.  Mahuk smashed two Teppo-gami apart, a burly Yari-gami only slightly smaller than the Vong himself, thrusting his Vibro-naginata into his side then leaping on to take Mahuk to the floor.

Both Coufees pierced the Lek’un Narduu’s chest, still Narduu did what he could to pin the beast's arms in place with more Yari-gami finished the creature, both confident they were earning favour in their master’s supernatural sight, both died assured of finding their rewards in the after life.

It made no difference, barely had Xanaea lifted the access hatch open than she was met face first with a half-charge las-arquebus shot to the face, searing through the hyper keratic of her cheek, flash flaking her teeth and tongue before a Lek’un boot kicked her in the forehead.

<<<<>>>>

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 8 - Collisions - Part 2

497 BBY — Katarr

His boot sploshed into the thin water of Katarr, cloak sweeping behind from the repulsor lifts of the various vessels that cluttered the few open areas.

200 Teppo and Yari Gami swiftly took positions at high and hard points securing the landing area, scout parties landed on the upper hills nearby to maintain a look out for the approach of enemy by ground or air.  The Lek’un Sonae typically efficient and enthusiastic for the slavish inconsequential race.

The rabble Anzat spewed forth from their motley collection of vessels, pathetic and slovenly. 

Rannek didn’t even begrudge the Lek’un’s disgust of them, but to ensure proper hierarchy was maintained issued quiet orders to the Efendí to punish those Lek’un who looked too far down their nose at the master race at a later time.

Whatever city this had once been, built into the side of a valley, it was long dead, the wreckage of the civilization casually reminding him of Anzat prime itself, but steely focus prevented him from slipping into the Kuru induced fog of his own memories.

He could feel them out there as he stood amidst the ruined buildings, water and salt damage crawling up the columns and walls.  Five of them. Watching…waiting…

“Where. Is. My. DAUGHTER!” his voice boomed off every surface, the water rippling round him as if unwilling to touch the tainted Gaki, consumer of so many Anzat souls in the abhorrent practice of aminopaphagy.

The tumble of rubble signalled not a slip in concealment but a deliberate signal that Rannek did not miss.

Turning to look at the top of a small tower a shadowy figure - not due to any trick of the light but the nature of their strange apparel emerged.

To Rannek she was something from a fevered dream. 

Her armour was rich blood red, almost black, hair vibrant crimson, eyes a glistening emerald green set in skin of pearlescent white. 

It recalled images of Daemons on Temple walls. The oldest illustrations in ancient caves upon Shivas showed the Shinigami as women of pallid rotten skin, blood pouring from their loins - death from where life should come - their nakedness covered by locks of crimson hair.

She seemed a technologically modernised embodiment of the myth.

“Aephrodaea captured, all Extolled lost” Lya whispered via Milaea’a earbud as she looked down on the strange force before her.

Milaea well knew from Ari that Anzat were solitary, to see 67 assembled in one place was astonishing, a haphazard accumulation of hissing hunched creatures - save for one.

He wore archaic plated armour held together by seemingly delicate leathers and cords, a fearsome helm in the face of a hungry animal of some kind on his head, a cloak of deep blue with a symbol of two blossoming red camellia that seemed familiar in the same way this whole planet was to her - a memory of another life she never knew she had.

His armour matched that of the large body of soldiers, armed with Vibro-naginata or Las-Carbines they looked roughly like Twi’leki’s, but unusually had a single very thick lekku and wore head armour designed to keep it well protected.

But more than all this, the Shadow in the Aether seemed to spread from the leaders body, a walking sentient blot within the Aether, the eye of the invisible storm that had darkened their power and sent their children into coma’s.

The Shadow was almost absolute, the only Aether energies they could access were through the ‘light side’ techniques they could imperfectly emulate from Temple Jedi, a power that resented Aethan touch at best.

Goddess and Gaki viewed each other with equal suspicion as Druhanne stepped forward, unfurling a parchment scroll -  a Declaration of Annexure.

“By the Grace and Glory of the Honourable Undefeated Clucir of Q’Atrox, Rannek-Soma, mare Caste, First of His name, Son of Jeshu the Wise, Hanshõ of Kinde Q’atrox, Defender of the Evokation, Supreme Lord of the Circle of Nine, First Protector of the Echo Throne, Shogun of the United Armies of Anzat Prime, Benevolent Intercessor of the Grateful Lek’un -

I Druhanne 248th Efendí in devoted thankful service to Kinde Q’atrox declare this planet and all its beings, chattel and fixtures under the possession and exclusive use of my Noble Hanshõ for so long as it remains his pleasure.”

The words of a dead language trickled into the Aethans minds, understanding flowed from depths of their Eidetic Cortices. 

They had never heard the strange complicated tongue of Old Anzati, and yet somehow they knew the words even if they understood little of the meaning  - only Ari by virtue of her adoptive father Kazic Ovarug, understood any of Druhannes references from an old small book the Vhal’Dan Anzat had kept on the Seigniory  Discord, Aethan eidetic memory and hyper-neuronal linkages ensuring it was brought to mind.

The words were arcane, Rannek was a name she knew, the feared Gaki of Anzat, but those were half mythologized tales of events 10,000 or more years ago. Surely such a being, had he even existed, live to this day?

He stood - the Shadow in the Aether personified.

“Now you will tell me Shinigami,” the Hanshõ spoke, removing his Gaki helm, the Efendí retreated, the Sonae marked the Aethans and Extolled where they could find them in preparation.
“Where are my children,”

Milaea stared back in utter incomprehension, her intention to introduce herself as simply part of an archaeological expedition stillborn in the hate filled eyes of the gaunt Anzat, the corrupted nobility of his features somehow more fearsome than the carved metal monstrosity of his fanged helm.

“We don’t know who you are, let alone your children, We…” Milaea’s reply in an old tongue that felt familiar yet new in her mouth was cut short as she spied among the Anzat an unwelcome face.

“....Vzin Kree…” she whispered through gritted teeth. 

The Anzat that had purchased Evyn and Evaea, raised them as assassins, intending to feed on their ‘Soup’ when they were sufficiently ‘ripe’.

Decades ago her biological father Jarys had freed the twins and beaten Kree to death on the arid, noxious moon of Dypseth.  Her single act of mercy had been to give Kree enough energy to live, a repayment for sparing the Twins till adulthood.  Her vow was if she ever saw him again she would turn him to dust for trying to consume them.

Rannek glanced at the petulant druf, the least useless of the scum that called themselves Anzat.

“The Shinigami speaks your name druf not mine, Why?”

“This is no Death Demon you superstitious old Fool!” Kree snapped, his tongue free even if the Yokusei chained his body.
“This is a meta-human creature, not to be trifled with, even by you,”

Rannek ignored the druf

“Be done with the druf for all I care, Shinigami, and my Fate also, but not…” his eyes hardened Anima building, the Shadow in the Aether intensifying, Milaea doing all she could to show any discomfort. now utterly certain this Anzat was the source of the Shadow.
“...not before you bring my children back to me!”

There was a momentary expression on his sin twisted patrician mask that perhaps only the gene crafted senses of an Aethan could see - the genuine hurt and longing of a father desperate to find his children.

“We don’t know who your children are, or where,” Milaea repeated with genuine empathy drawn from the fear she held for her own nieces and nephews.

“But we may be able to help, to work with you…We have skills in using the ‘Force’ as you might know it to look back in time, to read objects…but at the moment some kind of power you are using is stopping us from accessing it fully,”

Milaea tried her best to be reasonable, not only because with the Shadow so strong she had no real alternative, but she felt a deep sympathy for this being, almost a connection, as if they shared some trauma that, while never healed, could at least be lessened by coming together.

Rannek’s mouth tightened - What kind of Death Demon makes bargains?

“It seems you are correct druf,” the Clucir sneered
“This is no Shinigami, merely a Witch….,” he drew deeper on the Anima pulsing through the throng of Anzat thralls to both tighten his leash on their Will and grant them some modicum of extra power to face this ‘meta human’ the cowardly druf seemed so frightened of.

“Seize her,”

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 8 - Collisions - Part 3

497 BBY — Katarr

Fingers on taught bows and carefully aimed Hades rifles released as the last syllable left his lips.

Three Oblivion arrows and two Macro-maser Hades rounds sped straight at Ranneks head and neck with the precision of the Demi-god Aethans genecrafted reflexes, Sonae quickly took firing positions raising antiquated maroon blocky square defensive shields from bulky projectors.

Rannek dismissed the projectiles aimed at him with a mere twitch of his mouth dissolving the arrows and energy round with sheer force of his anima. He was a Lord not a mage, but he knew well how to harness the vast power he had consumed from the souls of millions over the millenia. 

The backwash of the Clucirs power hit them all as he summoned more of his Anzat powers, the leash of the Yokusei about the accursed impure excuses for Anzat slightly lessened

“Feed, if you can,” he sneered.

Added to the ranked fire of the teppo-gami the ravenous Anzat were unleashed, rushing toward the Aethans with slavering proboscis after being kept starving for so long. 

They were a mix of heavily armoured mercenaries, lightly equipped pirates and gangers, robed scholars flailing their arms, all their eyes red to purple losing any sense of sentience as they sought to feed, bounding on arms and legs across the muddy corrupted ground. 

They were quickly savaged by thud-bugs and yorek-launchers of the Extolled retinue, the Clucir showing only slight puzzlement at why he could not sense the extra galactic creatures, but trusting in the Sonae to dispatch them.

Knowing only the ‘Clucir’ mattered, Milaea drew forth all the power she could as the Aethans positioned themselves for an attack, the Anzat noble striding forward behind his quickly dying co-species with indifference before the attack was launched in full.

The slave races clashed all around them churning the mud of the swampy gardens and splattering the memorial plinths with blood and dirt -  Sonae Carbines cut into Voduun crab armour, Vibro Naginata  yielded to amphistaff, blorash jelly pinned Lek’un legs, Yari-Gami Tantō plunged into Vong necks.

Lyaea leapt over the chaos firing her arrows into the Feral Anzat to thin their ranks as Milaea hurled bolts of deadly disintegrating energy at Rannek head on.

The Crimson flares bounced off as he continued his slow approach, Milaea leaping down from the ruins as Kiraea and Aresaea flanked, breaking through the Sonae and Anzat with Sword and saber, culling four each.

Kiraea with dual Oblivion short swords still fully charged with Pyrokinetic energy and Aresaea with her immaculate Purple Sabers respectively leapt and slid at the Anzat Lord as Milaea concentrated another blast of deflagrating energy straight at him.

The three pronged attack occupied a fraction of a second, was immaculately aimed, delivered with incredible strength by their super human limbs to drive eldritch infused weapons through the few gaps in his thick plate anticipating his likely defensive motion - and more than that was the true death blow - Evaea using what little energy she had to use the Veil of Mist to round behind the Anzat with her Phase blade to plunge the weapons that phased in and out of the baryonic universe into his back.

How many living humanoids in that moment could survive a simultaneous attack by four Aethan women was likely numbered on one hand. 

Rannek was one of them.

With the fluid grace and elegance of a Kabuki performer, Rannek drew his Tremor-Katana, the mercurial steel shining blood red and hissing black smoke around him. 

With a light nonchalant grip Rannek-Soma Mare Q’Atrox drew on the shadowed memories of thousands of Sword-Kenin and Dozens of Blade-Sages he had supped on, Anzat for whom mastery of battle was a century long pursuit.

All five blades were turned aside, he stepped through every attempt to entrap him, idly deflecting Milaea’s razor sharp hair thin disintegrating beams with his open hand.
Ari’s purple sabers sparked ineffectually against his rapid blocks, Kiraea was shunted aside by riposte that nearly sliced into her throat - Evaea’s attempt at a killing stroke was ended as he suddenly flipped round to grip her by the throat.

Lifting Evaea up he continued to deflect the storm of slashes and thrusts Kiraea and Ari pumped out, Aresaea blasting a heated wave of her own disintegration energy, the purple luminosity bubbled against an invisible shield around his body, then flew back into her breast sending her flying. 

Kiraea took a running leap to bring both short swords powered by the aether into the back of Ranneks neck.

Notching his Katana under his arm, blade reversed, he crouched then rose into her attack, the Katana slicing straight into her abdomen, Blackstone cracking under the weight of his anima, the blade slicing deep into and through her first stomach and the plate-like bones that shielded it.

All while he crushed Evaea’s neck till the outer bone plates finally cracked, casting her aside as Milaea’s next fatigued blast came for him in hues of blood red.

Her own saber alight Mialea rushed him as Ari recovered, Kiraea and Evaea pushing themselves back up, genecrafted bodies able to withstand the damage inflicted thus far with grudging resilience.

All four surrounded him in a vicious sword dance, six blades against his one.  The strange women’s skills were a trifle to him, their enhanced dexterity and unnatural joint range a mere novelty to one who had centuries of skills infused into his muscle memory.

Ari could see the dismissiveness on Ranneks face as he flicked off another charged slash, reminded of how Jarys might ‘rough-house’ with his young sons - they were fighting at the limits of their demi-god capacity - the Anzat was humouring them.

Rannek’s only meagre curiosity was in the women’s obdurate resilience, they seemed to have some internal bone structures protecting muscle and organs close beneath their skin, unusual dexterity and no visible signs of fatigue despite the speed at which they moved.

They posed no threat to him - the only thing that did were the blackened silhouettes of armoured Anzat warriors in his peripheral vision that came slowly toward him. 

Each deflection and parry that drew from skills and power consumed, the victims of that hunger's ghosts closed in, their bloody noses and vacant eye sockets convicting his unnatural hunger for Anzat soup.

These revenants, decaying and emaciated, forced Rannek to end this play swiftly.

Basking in the oil depths of his Anima he pulsed waves of Yokusei power that smashed the Aethan metaphysically, all but rupturing their connection to the Force. 

The demi-gods bodies remained upstanding, their weapons continued working, but their power was rapidly fading.

Lyaea sliced off the head of one Anzat, now alone as the last of her Extolled fell to fury of the feral Soup drinkers, proboscis ramming into the nasal slits of the ritually scarred Tsang II. 

The Gang-Enfrocer Anzat that fed vomited from its mouth at the sick ‘flavour’ of the Yuuzhan Vong, their lack of any connection to the Force making the Soup not just ‘thin’ but an actual negation. 

The extragalactic creatures strange amalgam of unheard of proteins and bio-fluids made the overall taste disgusting.  Yet the Anzat persisted, the starvation Rannek had imposed made even this disgusting Soup source desirable.

Shouldering off an Anzat twice her size but half her weight Lyaea snapped an arrow into the Gang-Enforcers head before the Teppo-Gami surrounded her, using the Anzat’s feral charge to take strong positions in the swampy algae covered ruins, firing on her from every side.

Evaea fell first, Rannek spinning through Ari and Kiraea’s attempt to trap him in a Checkmate between their swords to let Evaea’s drive her Phase blade in, instead Rannek released his own blade to swiftly grab her thrust and turn the blade back into her - Evaea only just able to ‘limit’ the baryonic phasing weapon to slicing into her right breast.

Another Yokusei wave rushed through Ari’s mind, a blizzard of darkness that she pushed through to drive her sabers at his leg, Kiraea at his head - the Anzat’s speed was beyond anything she had seen, he seemed almost static, as if she caught frozen glimpses of a broken holo-vid, never seeing fluid motion,

A snapping motion and his Tremor sword was between her blades, his other fist slamming into Kiraea’s bleeding wound - his mistake was thinking Kiraea, or any Aethan could feel pain as he understood it, Kiraea’s swords forced his head to snap back - but he expertly interlaced his sword with Ari’s saber, a rapid strong flick and she lost her grip on both.

Before the lack of tactile sensation from the sabers flying from her fingers could register the Tremor sword sliced up in her armour's inner left thigh gap, stopping only when it ground against her near diamond strength bone.

Rannek was already withdrawing to slice it once more into Kiraea’s neck, again the irritating creature's armour and unusually strong bone allowing them to escape a fatal blow.

It hardly mattered, Ari fell hard and Rannek deftly twisted to elbow her head down then cut into her back, Kiraea retreating away in indolent rage gripping two wounds waiting for Aethan clotting and vascular constriction to take effect.

Milaea tried to buy them the time, alone the Goddess tried to ‘duel’ the Gaki. She fell back on her earliest techniques, the stances and motions Soryu had taught her, a nearly impregnable defensive form of his own design that was as much meditation and as motion.

The Clucir of Q’Atrox smashed through it in three quick strokes, crushing her arms back into her shoulders, his Anima enhanced strength forcing her to the ground.

All round the Lek’un soldiers were now on the Aethan women, the Vong wiped out.
The Lek’un rammed Vibro-naginata at Kiraea, Ari, and Evaea’s already open wounds.

They resisted hard, killing the comparatively weak Lek’un with each fulsome blow they could manage, but numbers overwhelmed them.

Following the Q’Atrox tradition the Lek’un broke limbs on opposite sides of the body of every Aethan woman, then slammed hands and feet against fallen columns and broken walls - hammering them over and over until the super-human bone relented and cracked at last.

Milaea could do nothing to stop the physical demolition of her sisters, of her own wife, the Aether utterly subsumed beneath the Ocean of the Shadow that spewed in waves from the corrupted creature that now kicked her into the muddy waters with the strength of a mag-train.

Cold and rotten the murky swamp soils filled her mouth and nose as she fell, a foot crushed between her shoulder blades, a sword pierced her in the small of the back and twisted as she gagged on the muck.

The Aethans remained defiant but impotent, red waves of an awareness of damage filled their somatosensory cortices, the Lek’un respecting their opponents did not cry in pain, unaware Aethans had been crafted not to feel any.

The feral Anzat fought over eating the nausea inducing Vong, stale Lek’un, and slightly richer Anzat dead, killing more of their own in the competition for Soup.

They tore each other off bodies to feed on already half supped dead and nearly dead, eeking out what flavour they could.

For Rannek it served only a reminder of the inevitable reversion to bestial primitivism his own aminopaphagy had set in motion.

The ghosts of dead warriors of forgotten wars and fallen houses crowded round him resenting his use of their memories and experience to win so many duels and battles over the millennia, hungering to drive him into the depths of Kuru madness.

Grimacing against their intrusion the Gaki pushed the ghosts away with their own stolen Anima. Beneath him the Red-armoured witch still tried to rise despite his sword in her back.

Stomping between her shoulder blades, then on the back of her head driving her further into the muddy ground ceased her writhing.

The Gaki sheathed his blade, reached down, and lifted the bleeding Goddess by the neck.   
     

<<<<<>>>>>

[TheDutchman]

The aptly named chapter, "Collisions," couldn't be more true.

Our Aethans have come face-to-face with the Shadow, not only to their detriment but indeed their regrets.  With Rannek's Herculean control of the Force, they find themselves de-powered to "merely" superhuman...yet within the Hanshõ's incredible repertoire of Force abilities, one believes that he'd be more than a match for even a peak-powered Mili.  Worse still: he has now focused his entire wrath upon the Aethans, convinced as he is that it is they who have (or know something about) his children. 

And like the myths of old, we can see how and why the gods weep.

Now we see that the function of the Yokusei IS (or at least precedes) the Shadow...which begs the question if it is but a part of the problem, why are the children still catatonic?  Could it be that Rannek's very Force Presence, the enormity and entirety of his Anima, is so strong, so STYGIAN, that it has now become a permanent effect of his existence?  The next question becomes: how can one fight against such when even Force-savant demigods are crushed underfoot by the mere whims of the Anzat Eldar?  Perhaps more information is needed before even a token resistance is attempted (and even then, only after true preparation has been enacted).

It is not lost that the two client species--both Extolled and Lek'un--are the charnel ground between two godlike forces, convinced they will find glory and self-worth in death in the service of their respective Masters.  How does one gain advantage when both combatants are more than willing to die for their beliefs?  Perhaps in that lies some of the answer in the strategy against Rannek.

One facet that should not be forgotten: there is a familiarity that the Aethans and Rannek sense in both sides, something felt but elusive, perhaps not even tangible.  Or maybe it's that power recognizes power. 

If that's the case, then Rannek may prove the victor given that in a war such as this, power is the most important capital considered.

Meta-note: Excellent battle scene(s); THIS is how to do brutal fights right!  It also proves the age-old adage that there is always someone stronger, faster, better than you.

Also: FT's rendering of the Aephrodaea still looks as incredible as it did the first time I saw it 

Chapter 9 PLEASE 

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 9 - Visions - Part 1

3952 BBY — Katarr

*Excellent Fan Film showing the Desolation of Katarr*

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Fl48HXJhSg" target="_blank" class="aeva_link bbc_link new_win">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Fl48HXJhSg</a>

3947 BBY — Visas

She sat at the heart of a dead world.

Winds howled through the rounded buildings, colonnades and arches twisting the breeze into screams that carried the horror of the degrading bodies to her ears even as it whittled those bones into dust.

She had returned here to at last have True Vision. 

To Witness what had eluded her ever since she was left broken and alone, the last survivor of Nihilus Hunger that rendered her planet lifeless.

Meaning.  Purpose.

Not a meaning to the destruction itself, that was impossible, but the meaning and purpose that the Future would give the Devastation that had already come to pass.

Face held against the bitter wind that spat the dust of decayed bones against her skin, pooling in the absent whorls of her vestigial eye sockets, she at last had Vision as vessels Now and Then Approached each bearing their own unique and inextricably linked Doom.

<<<<>>>>

12654 BBY — The Lek’Un

The Paper Shoji gently slid open, dull light from lanterns illuminating the hunched form of Rannek-soma mare Q’Atrox as he poured over his missives and correspondence, gentle scents of Lavandula that reminded the Clucir of his beloved daughter.

Fallyn smiled gently to imagine these scents were all that remained to remind Rannek of his precious Misíta.  The Lek’un serene as he closed the door behind him, small droplets of blood on his robes of office, the dagger in his cloak wetting his shirts.

“What is it Efendí,” Rannek grunted, shifting uncomfortably, even beneath the Q’atrox blue robe he wore personal armour, the threat of assassination by another another Kinde, even within the mare ever present.

“I bring a message from my Hanshõ,” Fallyn replied, kneeling in the Seiza pose to honour not Rannek but his True Hanshõ.

Rannek snapped up, noting immediately the voice was different from the latest in the abundant Druhanne and Druhanna’s that served as Efendí.

“Kızlar Ağası? What is this?” Rannek’s hand was quickly on his tanto, the Anzat’s eyes hardened as the words trickled past the immediacy of the surprise

“Who is your ‘True’ Hanshõ assassin,”

With a brutal kick Rannek sent his seated desk flying, drawing his Tanto in one hand summoning his Tremor-Sword with the other.

Fallyn remained in his kneeling pose, he knew he could not kill Rannek, and had no wish to, he had slain only those Lek’un he had to to gain access to this room.

Rannek stilled his breathing as the Chief Eunuch remained unmoved, fearing a poison gas attack was the means of murder the Lek’un scoundrel intended.

“Sword Kenin to ME!” Rannek yelled with his last breath before closing his lungs.

“My Hanshõ sends his greetings from among the Silent Voices,” Fallyn said nonplussed,

“And reminds you of his curse - You shall not die till every ghost you have made has had it’s fill of vengeance upon you.  This day, my brothers and I have fulfilled some small part of my Hanshõ’s last command.  You will never see you Son or Daughter again.”

Rannek’s face fell bitter and hateful as he stepped forward, gesturing to the Sword Kenin, who now tore through the door, to hold back.

“What have you done,”

Fallyn smiled, locking eyes with the foul Gaki, an incredible breach of decorum and protocol, but the Soul Eater was less than even Lek’un!

“I delivered the message, that is my task, my brothers have done the rest, never informing me in the slightest. I welcome the Pit, I will embrace the Five Corrections and glory in the Three Humiliations - my screams will praise the name of my True beloved Hanshõ Tyrell-Vel-Ovarug, for whose vengeance I have dedicated my life,”

With a bitter sneer Rannek nodded.  Vel, would he never be free of them!.

“Take him to the Pit, put him to the Question - spare no instruments” Rannek ordered the Sword Kenin who gripped the unresisting Fallyn, slamming him to the floor and twisting both arms around to break them with wet pops.

The legs followed, knees crunched in to ensure there was no possibility of escape.

“Hanshõ, I will send immediately for our Astro-Transmitters to contact the Sínã  and Sine’s vessel,” The Prime Kenin bowed.

Rannek closed his eyes, surely if his twins had died he would have felt it…he sought through the growing power the Anima so many feedings had gifted him across the expanse, but his strength was limited, barely reaching beyond the system.

It was eminently possible the Lek’un was simply lying, a game by Nobles to divert his attention - certainly the kind of petty trick the Trudenn or Goachi might play.

Regardless he nodded his assent.  He would contact his children and ensure all was well with their Grand Tour of the Galaxy before they were wedded on their return.

Yes, surely this was a conspiracy designed to unnerve him, a handful of Lek’un could not possibly harm the Son and Daughter of the most powerful Lord on Anzat Prime, First of the Gaki - Rannek-Soma MareQ’atrox.

<<<<>>>>

3947 BBY — Unknown

The intense gravity of the nearby planet nearly tore Zhao’s Gift asunder as it crashed out of hyperspace on an uncontrolled helix, the 137 occupants, the Sínã  and Sine Q’atrox, their guard and attendants, thrown about as internital dampers and grav-rebalancers failed.

The Second pilot team now in control of the craft following the arrest of the saboteur Celeano did their best to repair the damage the triplet Lek’un had done in his efforts to enact the vengeance he had sworn in the Nectarin Garden.

Sine Mardenes mare-Q'Atrox could hear the traitors screams from the Bridge as the Sword Kenin enacted corrections of the First Degree to extract information from the Lek’un.

Another jolt and the ship spiralled once more, the Sínã  bending his knees and gripping the pilots chairs to remain standing and stable amidst the storm, he would not be seen as weak or yielding to such triviality as this.

His crimson eyes took in the fast working hands of the Lek’un pilots, his visage reflected back in the Dura-glass, his fathers harsh nose with his mothers reputed softer eyes.

While trained to fly smaller skimmers he had a passing understanding of the more complex vessel, from the indicators and dials he could see the situation was dire.
Structural integrity of the hull and frame had been compromised by the extreme gravity fluctuations, all dampers were burnt out trying to compensate.

Forward stabilisers were offline, port thrusters had been sheared off as they were vomited out of hyperspace making righting the ship almost impossible.

Worse, Celeano had disabled life support, air was no longer circulating, the carbon dioxide scrubbers offline, members of the Sonae were attempting to reroute and reboot the systems urgently.     

Mardenes briefly noted the two atomic clocks tracking Ships real time versus galactic nominal time were wildly different, over 8000 years in fact, but in light of the other immediate concerns he paid it no heed, it seemed the least of the fiendish Lek’un’s sabotage efforts.

“Lord, we cannot stabilize the craft, our current velocity will spiral us unceasingly,” the Lek’un pilot to the right informed him.

“Long range scans detect a planet ahead, we may be able to use the friction against its upper atmosphere to slow us down, however it risks the integrity of the hull further.”

There were no good options Mardenes understood, and he had to protect his beloved sister.

“I order it so,” he confirmed.

The next hours were spent a flurry of nausea inducing motion, Mardenes alternating between trying to comfort his sister who remained in the escape pod, and overseeing the pilots and getting updates on the interrogation.

Celeano gloried in the pain inflicted, screaming the sacrosanct name of his True Hanshõ, Tyrell Vel-Ovarug like a mantra.  Mardenes spite and understanding of the sabotage growing with each repetition.

Finally nearing the planet their scans indicated it was habitable, not only that but a vessel was in orbit.

Desperate, Mardenes issued the orders necessary.

“Signal that ship, if we must request assistance we must,”
The Lek’un complied

“No response Sínã …our short range communications seem to be working but…wait..” he turned up a knob to increase volume.

All that came through was garbled static.

It was too late anyway.

“Take us to the surface, the ship is forfeit, the atmospheric friction should slow us enough to land,” Mardenes ordered with assuredness for no Noble of the Kinde Q’Atrox would die so pitifully as from the intrigues of mere Lek’un. 

<<<<>>>>

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 9 - Visions - Part 2

497 BBY — Katarr

“SHOW ME WITCH!” the voice sent ripples through the stagnant waters of dead Katarr, the thick nutrient rich blood of the witches coven upon his face, splattered up from the wounds he had so easily inflicted.

A crumpled splash followed as Milaea was hurled to the ground once more, throat red from Rannek’s grip. 

They were stripping the other Aethans after having broken their limbs, hands and feet - standard Q’Atrox treatment of all prisoners to make escape virtually impossible. For those especially dangerous even more mutilations would be administered. 

For now Rannek withheld that instruction preferring to keep the threat of it as a tool.

Feeling like a rag doll covered in lead, Milaea was lifted once more by her neck,rotten water dripping from her face as he pressed it close to his own.

“Show me what happened to my children!” he demanded, the frustration of centuries unleashed on the witch,

She still had no idea who they were, or what evidence he had these children had ever been on this world.

Feeling her thoughts, still holding her by the neck he turned her to face the anachronistically decorated ancient vessel they had seen earlier, slowly sinking into the mud of time near the Miraluka Memorials.

Rannek had recognised it immediately- Zhoa’s Gift, the vessel he had commissioned for his children's first Grand Tour, named to honour their sainted mother, the least he could do to honour her in death, after causing her such suffering in life.

Milaea’s tears, poured over his fingers like Zhoa’s had after he indifferently and aggressively ‘favoured’ her, desperate to obtain an heir as quickly as possible he wasted no time and spared no opportunity.

“Please…Lord…” Zhoa pleaded, her purple eyes glittering like amethyst in the crystal of her tears.

He sneered at her,

“You complain to perform your duty as wife, as bearer of the future heir of Kinde Q’Atrox!” he emphasised the words by slapping her face again, grabbing her by the cheeks and pulling her toward him, his proboscis tickling at her nostrils.

He had not hidden his Animopaphagy from her, why should he be ashamed of supping such deliciousness!

“You will bear me heirs or…”

Would he truly consume his own wife, the daughter of a noble, if impoverished Kinde of his own Caste?  Zhoa certainly believed it, his reputation for depravity was already…

A knee slammed into his chest as Milaea took the Anzat’s bizarre trance-like stillness as a chance to attack.

Coming back from his Kuru induced solipsism he gripped her harder and slammed the hilt of his sword into her head.

“Strike me again and I give your coven to the Abominations that think themselves Anzat for supping!” he growled, ensuring the strange female humanoids still had something to lose he could bargain with if needed.

“This was their ship Witch,” he trust his sword at the skeletal rust and moss covered remnants of Zhao’s Gift
“Show me what happened with your Magicks,”

He threw her to the ground once more.

Milaea coughed blood as she struggled up, looking through matted hair and slick water to Ari and the others, dragged behind the Lek’un soldiers, legs and arms broken, stripped now to their body suits, exposed skin purple and black.

“I can’t…” Milaea half vomited
“...without…Force…”

Rannek looked down on the wretched witch he had thought, almost Hoped was a Death Demon at last come for him.

“Then use your powers witch, but only to serve me…” he pulsed the Yokusei power at her that she seemed, inexplicably, influenced by - not in the same way as an Anzat, her resistance was proof of that, but partially at least.

Like a warm wind the Aether rushed through Milaea, as if Rannek by will alone could allow her to breathe.  Instantly her aether attuned biology began working to heal her without conscious effort, allowing her to stand despite the cut in her back, lacerations and bruising itching with repair.

Glancing to the others she saw the effect was not shared by Ari, or anyone, only her. 
Rannek could pick and choose who suffered the Shadow in the Aether when he willed it.

How?, Why? she wanted to know…but for now could only…
“Obey” was Rannek’s Anima laced command.

Righting herself as best she could, Milaea gripped the threads of time in her shaking hands, the Clucir stepping close beside her in the crackling Crimson aura of her Flow Sight, and hard as she could she pulled the Veil of Space time back…

...back…..

<<<<>>>>

3947 BBY — Katarr

The dust of desiccated bio matter was the shroud that concealed the dead face of Katarr.

As soon as they stepped out of the Transport the raw emptiness of the lifeless world clawed behind the eyes of those who were Force sensitive, dry, sharp, as if to drag them into the lifeless chasm the once verdant city had become.

Isas Marr led the grim procession, followed by the Old Man, Varasian and Alixa, then and Atris, Mira.  Jaro, Lya and Kera Katas were close behind, the elderly Daro already too traumatised by proximity to attempt a landing remained on the Pallas Athena.

Their feet made imprints in the flakes that had once been Miraluka, flora and fauna, and now pooled and swirled in dust devils through empty streets and buildings. 

Banners of vibrant colours that had once exuded Force meaning visible to the sightless Miraluka fluttered in the wind stained by the dust, dead of the energies that had so carefully been infused into them.

Not even the smallest microorganism was spared Nihilus gluttonous consumption.

Of the whole party Atris seemed the most affected, to see, and indeed taste and smell, the results of her intrigues as the carbonized particles of the dead unavoidably filled her nostrils, was a sombre lesson.

“And people wonder why I don’t like killing,” Mira whispered as they trudged on following Isas,
“Whatever reason you think you had vanishes the instant its over, and this - this is what you’re left with,”

Her white and blue robes quickly stained, Atris could only nod, for this moment at least, in full agreement.

Isas steps were delicate but potent in their intent as she walked the boulevards so familiar to her toward the Haven Gardens, the ghostly quiet of the plaza’s and streets only heightening the discomfort.

She had feared she would break, that she would crumble. 

Instead she felt a buoyancy that urged her on, a certainty in her childrens presence that horrific as Katarrs fate was, it was not the end.

More than anywhere else the Haven Gardens emptiness struck her.  It had been the heart of the city, gardens, forested areas, memorials, theatres.  How many times had she walked its paths, felt the hard timelessness of the large Ob’rist trees that sheltered all, drawn in the scents of Fuch’sia nectar, heard the trill of the Mylil on the branches…

Now silence, absence except for the empty arbours and stepped terraces, and at its center the silent Sarcophagi of the Honoured of Katarr.

A single dull light filled her mind.

“Visas!” she cried, rushing forward, Varasian and Alixa chasing after her.

Visas Marr gently slid back to the present as her aunt rushed to her with unbridled joy, the pain of the past, and the anxiety of the future forgotten in the glee of reunion as Isas Marr grabbed her niece tightly, almost toppling her to the ground.

”This means nothing to me,” Rannek hissed at Milaea “Do not test my patience further,”
Grunting with effort Milaea pushed past the images of astonishment, joy, introduction, question, and answer….

Visas was not surprised Isas had found her, welcomed the Katas’, Varasian and Alixa warmly, acknowledged Mira and Atris.

Behind them the Old Man kept his distance, wary and cautious as a strange figure who had remained alone in the transport till now approached him.

The Old Man stared at the sky as the Miraluka spoke, Isas explaining how she had been scouring the galaxy for survivors, the new colony, the unwillingness of Alpheridies to genuinely help.

“The time is nigh,” The Lek’un passenger said to the Old Man, his ancient transmitter now vibrating as his triplet approached closer and closer.

Lek’un…Rannek’s vision narrowed on the interloper, recognising the face of his daughters Chief Eunuch…and yet not…a twin or triplet. 

“Did you see what you came to?” Isas asked her hand never releasing her nieces for a moment.

“I…I saw that this…” she nodded to the Sarcophagi of the Honoured caked in the dust of those Nihilus had consumed 
“...was the Doom of Katarr, but not the end of its blood line,”

She turned her face to the wind-storms of flaked bio-matter swirling in the distance, the acrid scent in her nostrils.

“This Devastation will be given a meaning,” she squeezed Isas hand a sadness flowing through her aura as her aunt smiled
“But what you create will never escape the echoes of what happened here.”

“Every generation will feel the Shadow of Katarr,” Isas acknowledged
“But that we will have future Generations is, if not consolation, then purpose enough for me to live on,”

Varasian and Alixa’s eyes suddenly snapped skyward as the roar of a Lion and the screech of a Banshee ripped through the sky with a tail of flame and smoke.

Hurtling toward the surface was Zhoa’s Gift, speeding as if aimed straight at them.

The pilots hit full reverse thrust, slammed the landing fins open and deployed drag parachutes to slow it as much as possible.

The ornate vessel in the grip of Katarrs gravity seemed to have a will of it’s own, pushing through the soot clouds, the Lek’un pilots trying to keep it from scraping the hills as long as possible, Mardenes gripping the back of their chairs as Celeano cried out in agony ,the ‘Questioning’ of his treachery not ceasing for something as trivial as the ship crashing.

The first dorsal fin scraped the cracked earth below, plumes of dry soil burst up, Zhao’s Gift another touch and the fin was sheared off flying into the port drag parachute, ripping the glimmering fabric apart.

The belly bounced one the surface, scraping through the protective paints and lead layers to the bare steel beneath, ricocheting the occupants within. 

A brief respite came as it hit stagnant filthy water filled with the rotten micro fragments of what had been abundant fresh water life forms.

The spear tipped prow of the Anzat vessel crashed into the lip of the Dam’s edge, an vast earthen back that held the water from nearby mountains in a freshwater inland sea that had provided for the nearby city.

As Zhao’s Gift flew free once more into the valley below the sudden impact sent cracks down the earthen dam wall.

Varasian immediately grabbed Mira hauling her entire weight up with seemingly no effort, Isas and Visas leapt to the top of the Sarcophagi to join them as the first trickles of the stagnant water that their descendants would be beaten bloody in streamed along the ground.

Seconds later as the ship plunged to the new ground level, a wave of black silt and rot filled water crashed after it.

The Anzat ship tumbled over itself as the Miraluka, human and Hybrid party took refuge where they could, the flood waters fortunately only knee high, but the tumbling ship kicked up chunks of rock, stabiliser fin’s and filigree flying off at dangerous velocities as it buried itself into the dry soil of Katarr, now wetted by the draining lake.

As soon as the Ship had stopped its rolling, Mardenes was ordering his men to cut the hull open, the vessel was lost. 

Triggering the emergency distress beacon he was certain his father would soon send aid.  For now he had to comfort his sister - the Enfanata sheltering in the escape pod with her handmaids, her Lek’un having offered themselves as living cushions to ensure her dignity was not offended  by being tossed about like the ship, many breaking limbs gladly in the process to keep the Daughter of their beloved Hanshõ upright and stable.

Mardenes own tremor sword sliced into the lacquered panels as the main hatches were beneath the water, First Sword Kenin cutting the other half of a circle, a rush of Anima power to telekinetically hurl the plug of metal out, Mardenes leapt out first, his hand quickly back in to assist his sister as the Kenin ushered her out clutching her Jewelry box.

As the Kenin, hand maids, servers, then finally Lek’un were pulled out Mardenes took a moment to survey the world they had crashed upon.

Ahead was a city shrouded in a lifeless dust, around receding murky waters draining across the plains till they were only ankle deep.  The air was full of tiny particles that stank of unnaturally charred flesh, like the burnt offerings of a Temple Sacrifice.  All around he felt the echoes of recent death like the blood misted ruination his father left after another victory on the Battlefield.

But there was no sound here, no cries for help, no groaning injured, no bodies, no blood, just the emptiness of a massacre that had killed in a way he could not understand.

His boots splashed into the waters that ebbed and flowed as the dam gave up its last waves. Ahead he spied gently rising mounds covered in large rectangular slabs, moving beings upon them.

“Kenin to me!” he commanded, pointing to the place ahead.
“Natives, secure the site and scout,”

“Thy will be done Lord!” was the echoed response from his Sword Kenin and the Lek’un Honour Guard.

Mira watched with growing dread as the crash survivors, after piling out, began establishing what seemed to be a perimeter, the vast majority armed with bizarre antique weapons.

The speed and precision of their movements was comparable to the best Mandalorian Super Commando squads she had seen.

“I’m not sure these guys are friendly,” she said aloud as the party tentatively came down from the Sarcophagi.

“You fulfill promise now,” the strange sentient with the single lekku accompanying the Old Man spoke in broken Basic. 

Mira hadn’t even seen him on the ship to the planet, but what she saw now was something even more perplexing - the weird sentient resembled some of those that had just crashed.

“We will,” the Old Man said grimly taking his saber in hand,

“This isn’t a coincidence…” Mira realised, understatement of the millennium she knew as it left her lips.
Nothing, she had come to learn, ever was. Not her losing her birth parents, not her being raised by Mando’s, then found by Meetra, then hired by Isas, and not the downing of this weird vessel and its strange occupants.

“Stay here,” Varasian said unfastening his cloak and casting it aside revealing the heavy Exar-Kun era armour beneath, Alixa doing likewise

“We will handle this,"

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 9 - Visions - Part 3

3947 BBY — Katarr

Already a group of Sword Kenin and Lek’un were approaching, among them a particularly effeminate one in now soiled formal robes, who ran ahead and shouted.

“By the Grace and Glory of the Honourable Undefeated Clucir of Q’Atrox, Rannek-Soma, mare Caste, First of His name, Son of Jeshu the Wise, Hanshõ of Kinde Q’atrox, Defender of the Evokation, Supreme Lord of the Circle of Nine, First Protector of the Echo Throne, Shogun of the United Armies of Anzat Prime, Benevolent Intercessor of the Grateful Lek’un -

I Bramnid  acting as Kızlar Ağasıin in devoted thankful service to Kinde Q’atrox declare this planet and all its beings, chattel and fixtures under the possession and exclusive use of my Noble Hanshõ for so long as it remains his pleasure, his Son and daughter acting as Regent until his arrival!”

Only one being understood the archaic tongue.

Kullat stared with unconcealed hate as he approached behind the Old Man and his hybrid creatures, Atris, Jaro, Lya and Kera Katas with them.  Everything had proceeded as he had hoped, the Anathema’s children delivered by Celeano on time, Fallyn’s plotting bearing fruit, the Nectrin Garden Oath moments from being fulfilled.

“Ready yourself niece,” Isas warned Visas, “These creatures are not peaceful,”

Behind Bramnid came Sine Mardenes mare-Q'Atrox himself observing the humans, some of whom strangely lacked eyes - but all of them….

All of Them! smelled rich and sweet in Soup, thick flavourful souls ripe for consumption. 

So delicious he could barely focus on the single Lek’un among them.

“You, Servant! What Kinde do you belong to!” Mardenes demanded, the Lek’un was wearing simple travellers cloaks that were practically ornate to Mira’s view, absent any insignia.

Kullat stepped forward, hands tightly gathered then threw open his outer robe.

Beneath was a large rounded carefully stitched symbol of leaves - the trefoil leaf design of the Kamon of Kinde Ovarug of the Vel caste representing the valuable Acer leaves of their demesene. 

At last Kullat could stand before Anzat and proudly reveal his true loyalty, praying the Silent Voices heeded it though distant from Anzat prime.

“Vel!” Mardenes snapped enraged to see his fathers old enemies agents here, the Sword Kenin drawing Katana instantly, Lek’un raising rifles.

The party responded, the Old Man and Atris sabers snapping on, the Katas Crystalline blades shimmering with Miralukan Force energies, Varasian and Alixa’s own sabers snap hissing on.

“What the hell is he saying!” Mira demanded catching up to them
“What the hell is going on here!”

“Stay out of this Huntress,” the Old Man growled

Mira had closed her eyes to this circus long enough - no more.

She stepped between the two groups just 15 meters apart, the soil soggy beneath her feet as it ate the flood waters up.

“You just crashed, you really want to pick a fight?” she glared at Mardenes, the Anzat noble insulted a Gaijin dared meet his gaze, let alone a female one!

“And you,” she stared at Kullat
“Is this what you’ve been sneaking around doing, plotting to bring down their ship? Why, what for? What the frell could possibly be worth more death?!”
She spread her arms as if to embrace all Katarr

“Isn’t this entire damn planet a reminder of how shavit stupid killing each other is? You can all feel it, don’t pretend you can’t!”

She looked fixedly at Isas
“We Found Visas, we found the Katas’ and the other families, you got everything you wanted, what more is there,”

Isas didn’t reply, no one except her husband back at the colony of Aethas understood the full extent of her plans to create a new, stronger, smarter generation of Katarr’s descendants.

“What are these?!” Enfanta Sínã Faveah mare-Q'Atrox interrupted having approached.

“Beloved Sister, for your safety stay back!” Mardenes advised

Faveah was unconcerned as only the daughter of the most powerful warlord of Anzat Prime could be - no sane being would risk her fathers ire after all.  She joined Mira between the two groups

“They smell delicious…” Faveah noted as Mira stared at the Anzat, none of them had ever seen Anzat before, so rare were they by that era.
Gently reached out to Mira’s red hair, taking a loose wet strand round her finger
“Fascinating…brother I hunger…”

Mira could not understand her, she wondered if she wasn’t also trying to end hostilities before they started.

“Mira get away from her!” Varasian demanded “You can’t know how dangerous that species is!”  there was a masculine steel in his vice Mira had never heard before

“Sister that Lek’un accompanying them is loyal to the Vel this is the conspiracy, using Gaijin to assassinate us!” Mardenes explained

“If that were so they would’ve destroyed the ship outright,” Faveah countered turning to Kullat deigning to grace him with her gaze.

“No, they want something more…what is it you desire faithless cur?”

“I will see you suffer beyond reason,” Kullat replied

He had travelled billions of kilometers and thousands and years for this.  Found himself in a time when the Evokation was all but dead, Anzat scattered one in a trillion to find, seeking something to torment the children of the Gaki when Celeano delivered him.

By Fate or Doom the Old Man had been seeking Anzat and Lek’un for a reason that was beyond blasphemous. By Grace of the Silent Voices, he found Kullat instead. 

Kullat promised to deliver him not just one, but potentially dozens of Anzat - and so a deal was struck.

Faveah gave Kullat and his petulant Gaijin a withering look, never doubting the ability of her brother, Sword Kenin and Honour Guard - the most feared across the entire Evokation to dispatch with such riff raff.

“You will live many decades in the Pit,” she promised Kullat with vicious tones, then turned sweetly to her brother.

“Honoured Brother, do spare some of them for supping, their soup is so rich!”
Mardenes gave a crooked smile his own proboscis tingling.

Elegantly heading toward her brother she took a half dozen steps, Mira still completely in the dark as to what was being said.

Then Faveah paused.  After such a scare with the crash, and the delightful fresh scent of Mira…she just couldn’t wait.

Like lighting she leapt at Mira, her hands pressing the side of the red haired bounty hunters head inwards, pulling her neck back to expose her nostrils, the sweet musk of Mira’s soul so intoxicating Faveah’s proboscis were already rigid.

The Anzats telepathic anesthetic power flooded through Mira’s mind making her limbs fall limp, neck straining as only Faveah’s strength was holding her upright.

A shattering white force pierced her awake as Atris intervened. Her Saber cutting in, forcing Faveah to leap back.

Mira’s head swam back to full lucidity, the force flowing through her with Atris prompt, the red maned huntress nodding appreciation to the Jedi Master who was already engaged.

Much had happened in the intervening few seconds, Varasian and Alixa engaged with one of the Sword Kenin, the Katas’ siblings and mother likewise, the Old Man hacking a Lek’un Yari-Gami apart with unseemly ferocity.

Jedi, Luka Sene and Aethas Colonists drew heavily on the force and their training to counter the archaic armoured Sword Kenin and swift Lek’un, Visas forced to light her own red saber as she felt the ravenous hunger of the Anzat for their very souls, her mind retching backward to after tastes of Nihilus.

Isas less proficient in close combat sheltered but hurled waves of telekinetic energy to support her children and keep the Lek’un down. 

The Anzati had rarely encountered force wielders, even among the hundreds of battles they fought in the Discord only a handful wielded enough Anima to use such abilities, and even then the ‘Ninpo’ were largely only basic kinetic attacks.

Atris used her force enhanced speed and crisp Shien style to round through two Lek’un, her blue blade severing three limbs in less seconds, but found in the Sword Kenin an adamantium wall.

Elite soldiers of the most powerful Kinde on Anzat prime, the Q’Atrox Sword Kenin were all Blademasters, skills honed over decades of training and war, or gained through the consumption of their enemies, Lek’un and Anzat alike.

The O-Yoroi armor of hundreds of overlapping plated steels resisted glancing blows from the Lightsabers, weapons they had never encountered before, being barely existent in the past they had been wrenched from.

Kera Katas felt a mere apprentice again, she had fought two wars as Luka-Sene, yet the Anzat swordsman skill and grace was near overwhelming, only the constant chill and guidance of the Force through her limbs kept her from death.

Even Jedi Master Atris was retreating back, the Anzat far greater strength and speed more than offsetting her Force powers, her knees buckled blocking blow after blow that came at every angle, a brutal bladed knee lunging for her breast, she stumbled back exposed.

The TremorSword fell swiftly but was blasted at the last instant by Mira’s shot. 

Repaying Atris assist she fired her arm mounted grenade launcher straight into the Sword Kenin, the Sonic grenade sending dense micro-amps coursing over the Anzat, his ear drums bursting, head spinning, allowing Atris to recover and skewer him with her blade - it barely penetrated at first until a Force push from Isas helped cut into the body.

Only Varasian and Alixa seemed physically matched Anzat, the hybrid children used the Force to offset lower skill, Alixa bursting flares of Force lighting, Varasian kinetic tugs at the ankles.  They were still slowly losing.

Lek’un rushed to reinforce, Jaro and Lya struggled to deflect the shots the Teppo-Gami fired while at a full sprint as Visas entered the fight beside Mira.

Just like Dxun, Onderon and Dantooine the two fought side by side, drawing on all Meetra had taught, Mira’s hunting and Visas Miralukan skills.  Barely enough to keep the lone Sword Kenin that flurried blows interspersed with shurikens at bay. immolating a Shuriken against her Sentinel yellow blade Mira yelled
“Cover me!”
Visas stepped up red saber taking the brutal Kenin blade, her shoulders and elbow feeling they would give out.  Mira swiftly reloaded her grenade launcher and from a crouch fired into the Sword Kenin locked with Alixa.

The frag grenade sent sharpened splinters into his left side, Alixa capitalising to slice him down and run to Mira and Visas' aid.

Once eight Sword Kenin, six remained.  His sister retreating behind the Lek’un, Mardenes decided he must intervene against these witches and warlocks.

Wet earth splashed far as they cut and dogged, shot and struck at each other, Jaro down on one knee from a wound that had all but severed his leg, Atris bleeding from a cut at her perfectly white hairline, Visas back aching from muscle tears.

Mardenes aimed at the Old Man, the grizzled veteran dispatching another Lek’un - the human biting back the pain from his own wounds - blade and blaster shot - with a gentle hum of lips, techniques a life left behind, instinctively retreated to, despite himself.

BattleSong on his lips the Old Man locked blades with the Anzat, feeling the strength of youth and a High borns confidence bear down upon him, the Force alone keeping him up.

“Dammit use them!” he yelled back to Kullat, the sneaky Lek’un taking the first of four canisters from his voluminous robes now soiled by the sick waters of Katarr.

The first he threw where Lya and Jaro were protecting each other from the killing blow of a Sword Kenin, the massive armored warrior not seeing the glass beaker smash at his feet till it was too late.

Created with technologies and synth-organic compounds that did not exist in Mardenes era, by a genius of biochemical weapons, the expensive Species specific suppression gas caused the Sword Kenin to waver and fall, freeing the two natural hybrids to help their mother.

Another breaker broke into the combat of Atris and a Kenin, again he fell, relieving her instantly to help Visas. The excess gas, designed to incapacitate Anzat, at close range filtered through the air, dimming the senses of the others, slowing their reflexes by half.

Mira reloaded with a gas grenade launching it at a Kenin who sliced it apart mid air only to find enough of the liquefied contents expanding out to cause him to tremble and lose focus, making him easy prey for Alixa to kick down.

Snapping on her Sentinel Yellow saber Mira blocked the shots of the increasingly irate Lek’un as Kullat about to hurl his last beaker of the suppressive gas was shot in the arm.

Scrambling to try and reload her launcher with her last concussion grenade Mira didn’t see or feel the approach of Faveah.

The vicious starving Enfanta rammed her Tanto into Mira’s side, then spun her round.

Mira’s mind swam not just from the blow, but the telepathic soothing the Anzat woman poured into her, lulling Mira into submission.  The far stronger Favea lifted the human, proboscis instinctually seeking the rich unique soup within.

Mira’s eyes rolled into her head as her nostrils were pushed wide by the boring tips of the Anzat, sliding them up toward the bone and the delicious brain fluids behind.

Dragging his viscera clogged sword from a Kenin’s body, Varasian, himself bloody and aching, snapped his eyes to Mira as her life was millimeters from ending.

Cold waves of his genecrafted ‘Adrenal Boost’ took hold and raw Force energy poured from his hand even as his legs leapt under control of his hind brain.

Varasian tore Faveah off Mira with barely a second to spare,  gripping the Anzat noblewoman's hair and ripping it back, tearing chunks out,  the human tracker free of the Anzat’s potent anaesthetic power looking up groggy as the young man hammered Faveah into the ground, the daughter of Q’Atrox was not supine, stabbing back with a needle blade from her corset, plunging the thin dagger into his thigh through the armour gap. 

With a grunt he smashed her to the ground then kicked her in the ribs.

Mardenes broke from his lock with the Old Man to help his sister, fury overtaking the Anzat with feral ferocity that set him less running than loping at Varasian.

With a snarl Varasian responded in kind.

The two slammed together in a medley of blades, fists and knees, biting and gnashing chunks from each others flesh - the fulcrum around which the Jedi and Miraluka created a barrier of sabers deflecting Lek’un fire back at them, alternately slamming them to the ground with the Force, hurling fallen weapons to keep them down.

Against a normal Human-Miraluka an Anzat ought to win easily, but Varasian and Alixa were as the Old Man had always hoped - something far far more - the best of himself, Isas and his lost Daughter and Sister,  mixed together by the Genius of Soron Varas.

In his peripheral vision the Old Man watched his nominal grandson tear at the Anzat, two beasts seemingly shorn of any trace of sentience much less civilization as they each fought to protect the females of their kind - Mardenes for his sister, Varasian for his would be mate Mira.

Sweeping up the fallen beaker from Kullat, Isas hurled it with the Force at the Last Sword Kenin, weaving it expertly around his attempts to dodge till it shattered anaesthetic gases into his face, leaving only the Lek’un warriors who were far less challenging for the array of experienced Jedi and Luka-Sene to deal with. 

Mardenes began getting the upper hand, Varasian was strong, energetic, but still not perfect, the Anzat took solid blows to chest and grabbed the hybrids arm twisting it swiftly round, then kicking his feet from under him. 

Quickly rounding on Varasian, Mardenes put him in a head lock a fraction away from snapping the neck when Mira’s saber cut into the Anzat’s shoulder.

The ground was a mess of blood and scent stripping vapours from the gases as the Lek’un suicidally rushed to their Lord and Ladies side only to be beaten down by Atris, Visas, Kera, Jaro, Lya and the Old Man - Alixa joining her brother to put Mardenes down.

His face falling into the mud, Mardenes tried to push up seeing only his pained sister's expression beside him before something heavy and firm rammed into the back of his skull.

Faveah screeched, her voice listlessly echoing into the distance as her figure faded along with images of the bodies, only the glow of the sabers remaining as Milaea’s strength drained, unable to keep herself and Rannek viewing the past any longer.

“Not yet Witch!” Rannek demanded gripping her violently

“What did they do, where did they take them!”

Milaea’s face scrunched in effort as she pushed past the dying ebbs of the skirmish, the binding and tying of the captive Anzat as crew from the Pallas Athena arrived to assist them, the Lek’un survivors rounded up, Celeano found a bloody barely living mess after his ‘corrections’.

Finally she found a point where there might be a clue - Isas and Visas speaking before the ramp to a transport.

“...most will survive, we have adequate facilities,” Isas soothed her niece
“...come with us, to Aethas…”

 

<<<<<>>>>

[Lord_S_Gray]

Chapter 9 - Visions - Part 4

497 BBY — Katarr

Already on the edge, the word Aethas pushed Milaea into unconsciousness.  She had no understanding of any of the events she had been forced to Flow Sight to witness, no knowledge who any of the beings were or what they were trying to do.

Despite herself she fell back into Rannek’s painful grip, the Ancient Anzat catching her abnormally heavy body, her head dropping back over his arm.

As real time reasserted itself against the grudging tear Miaea had created he stared into the exhausted face of the Witch, a soft violet glow beneath her eyelids as her magicks diminished.

But he was not without his own fatigue. 

Suppressing the Witches will forced him to draw deeply on his Anima, an anima bled from each one of his millions of victims, the more he drew upon it, the stronger the mind rending effects of the Kuru became.

His body felt light, his head filled with images of gaping faces and bleeding noses, eyes wide in shock and horror as he tasted their souls in their last moments.

Yet he had seen his Children for the first time in 10,000 years, knew the name of the place where they were taken by their attackers. 

Aethas. 

He would reach Aethas, no resource he possessed would be spared...and yet somehow he knew the Witch would be his most valuable asset in reaching it.

Yet in his soul rotten flesh tumbled over him, disembodied spirits screamed bloody vengeance in his ears, his hands and feet felt heavy dragged to the Dread still Oceans of the damned, the Kuru building to the point of return.  He could use his vast Anima no longer.

Releasing her, Milaea crashed into the sodden ground exactly where Faveah had so long before, he bent to his knees over her, staring into her face as he fought to keep his thoughts from wavering.

The perfect features flickered from the alabaster white and red to the deep azure and svelte grey of his Misíta, the images of the fallen witch and Faveah blending in his mind.

“Hanshõ! Apothecary!” Druhanne called

“Take…her back to her rooms…” Rannek ordered

The Efendi was perplexed, so far as he and all the others had witnessed, his Hanshõ had grabbed the Witch, then for half a second a red glow had emanated around them, then the witch collapsed onto the Clucir. He, and every being but Rannek and Milaea were utterly ignorant of the Flow Walking and all that had been seen.

“Rooms Lord? Forgive me but I do not…”

This Druhanni irritated Rannek with her questions

“Take my Misíta to her rooms and have the maid servants attend her immediately!” he growled pointing at his daughter as she lay overcome on the tatami,

“Is it not obvious she is in need!”

The walls of the Stormhold were wavering around him like melting plastic, in their distorted recesses faces were peering out, screaming aching to consume him as he had them….

Druhanne stood astonished as the Hanshõ pointed to the witch, calling her Misíta.  The Lek’un knew this was likely the Kuru speaking, but he was bound to obey his Lords command - cogent or not.

“I must meditate…” Rannek gasped as he swayed in the rotten winds of a dead world

“I must…”

The Abyss of Memory took him.

<<<<>>>>