“You were wonderful, my dear,” he said. “A born actress. I will inform our lady and allow her to deal the final blow.”

Panthar blew Shayla a kiss and laughed. He stepped to the side and turned towards the damaged ship.

“It is safe now, my most lovely of ladies!” he called out towards the ship. “Come, take what is yours!”

--------------------

But then he looked up.

The other red being had just attacked Phalomir, then called to the death-dealing ship.

Wakti stood, his hand instinctively wishing to reach for the spear that lay on the ground before him, once belonging to his fallen friend. But something told him to wait, that attacking the red being would be fruitless in this case. He glanced at the ship, remembering how his own spear had splintered against it.

No, not attack... retreat, find help.

Wakti stepped backwards, his small frame moving silently. He then ducked low and sprinted for the close protection of the trees. Once there he moved quickly but quietly from tree to tree, circling the clearing under the cover of the forest, making his way to the other side of the clearing where he knew the other giant red being was hiding. He had seen Phalomir practically throw that one away from the carnage caused by the ship, and his instinct screamed to find this being.

He glanced through the trees at the ship, and was surprised to see both the human female and the cowardly red being still where they had been. This distracted him enough that he did not see the prone Aelvedaar on the ground before him until red hand grabbed Wakti by the fur and pulled him to the ground.

“Beeja wah wah!” he whispered, his voice quite but frantic.

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"Shush now, shush!"

The voice in which I scold him is low, scarcely above a whisper, for I have no idea of what is transpiring -- or in fact has transpired -- since my Dark Brother left to determine the status of the situation now facing us. The fact that a frantically running ewok was the one to return, one whose movement through the trees was not only crackling with urgency but performed in a silence so profound as to be unheard by any ears other than a Sith's, is enough to raise more than mere suspicions as to my Brother's possible fate; it would do us no good to advertise our hidden presence to whoever captained that mysterious ship.

I frown, tightening my grip until his struggles cease and he gains control over his vocal chords. Only then do I remove my hand, now placing a warning finger across my own lips.

"What is it, little one, that sends you back in such a state? Has something happened to Lord Phalomir?"

I cannot help but wince slightly as the questions depart me, for upon their backs is carried yet another stab of pain from my side. A stealthy investigation of fingers reveals the presence of a hot, wet liquid; they gleam reddish-violet when I raise them to my eyes. I sigh then, aware that not only may I be injured a bit more seriously than I would like, but I do not have so much as a bandage, let alone my normal healing prowess, which to apply to myself. Clearly a case of "physician, heal thyself" gone seriously wrong.

Not knowing what else to do, I draw in a deep breath, and try to mimic pain-easing techniques I have heard the Warriors use in circumstances such as this, as I wait to hear what the tiny one beneath me has to say.

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Apparently Shayla is proving her worth, she thought to herself, not even bothering to consider the fact that yes, while the young blonde woman had indeed been engaged in conversation with Lord Phalomir, she herself had been unable to hear exactly what had been said.

Much less see her face, to thus read any emotion that might have flicked across it. All she had was a view of her backside, about which she had seen the movement of Panthar as he stealthily and quite efficiently dispatched her enemy.

Perhaps he was too successful!

The dark thought creased her features in an even darker scowl, sent shivering ripples of sweet, savory anger and hatred rushing through her body.

I want that delight; if he has killed him, he will pay with his own soul!

Nevermind the disquieting thoughts that had formerly danced throughout her; nevermind the possibility that perhaps all powers were nullified, even in the Darker Realms. All she had was that which was left in her, that which was indeed part of her being, and that darkness yowled and slavered for revenge and death and blood.

She didn't let one whit of this touch her features, but straightened her head and marched regally toward the hatch. An impatient slap or two about its frame finally met with the controls, and it slid upward, revealing a satisfying tableau spread out before her:

Lord Phalomir crumpled silent on the ground. Shayla's back still facing her, but now in motion as she began to turn in her direction. Panthar standing, victorious, on the other side of the fallen Dark Lord, his raised hand now landing cockily upon his hip. All this framed by myriad tiny, furry bodies, all splayed out in unnatural positions of death.

She smiled, and tossed her head, tightening her grip on her short sword as she strode to meet them. She came up beside Shayla, cast a triumphant look into the woman's eyes, utterly oblivious to any emotion that might be raging beneath the waters of the greeny-blue sea within them.

"First strike is to us!" she exclaimed in a savage whisper as she raised the sword, aiming its tip directly toward a killing spot between Phalomir's eyes.

[ 12-28-2009 10:17 AM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by ShaRhylla ]

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"Yes," she said darkly. "I suggest he be destroyed, slowly, painfully...

...and such things are done not just physically, but from the depths of the mind," she finished in an eeriely soft whisper.

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Anger flashed in her eyes, eyes which then narrowed like a predator's whose prey had given it the slip. She glared at Shayla.

"I do not waste my time with such things!" she spat, her sword gripped yet more tightly in her hand. But the dark look returned to her was enough to prevent her from physically attacking the young woman; with a great, shuddery indrawn breath, the halfling lifted her lips in a snarl.

"What do you mean?" she finally asked, after finally gaining control of herself. "I am warrior, and do not toy with my victims as a mere sandcat with a womprat."

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...and a rather logical, cold, and calculated reply came to mind almost immediately.

"This one is not worthy of the gift of dying quickly," Shayla clarified.

If truly ever at all, came an eerie mental addendum.

"He has used love and compassion to ensnare us all, has treated you with disdain and disrespect...

...and has withheld many secrets from us as well, secrets regarding the future that should be..." She paused for a moment, "... extracted from him. He deserves physical torment, and to die painfully and so very, very slowly. But he also deserves to know in horrible clarity all that he has lost, and how he has utterly failed. After all, the one thing that can hurt him more than death and physical pain is for your mother to realize what he truly is, turn on him....

...and destroy him..."

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ShaRhylla spat again, trembling with rage. Against who exactly that rage was directed didn't matter; at the moment she happened to be finding fault with the entire Galaxy along with everyone in it. But this...

"How can we get her to change her mind? You know she is pitifully in love with this, this..." She gave Phalomir's wound a vicious kick.

"Thing."

He groaned beneath her treatment, prompting her to poke the tip of her toe more delicately, more deliciously intentionally, deeper into his torn flesh. Pausing to watch his unconscious attempt to move away from what was tormenting him, she then shot another look Shayla's way.

"Look how easily he might be destroyed now," she hissed. "He is as nothing to us, nothing to me. And even if he was truly nothing to mother, what should we do with him until we get the pair of them together, so Mother can destroy him as you suggest? Should she even be persuaded to do so, that is, which is something I really doubt."

She let her eyes slide back to Phalomir, and gave his otherwise silent form another hearty kick.

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"Although I'm not certain here and now is the best place. Remember there were two humanoids in our sensor reading."

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She gave the young woman a strangely scrutinizing look.

"It is almost as if you do not wish to see this one dead."

Her foot lifted in unconscious preparation of delivering another blow, but was abruptly set down with the knowledge that his body was a bit beyond its reach. ShaRhylla snorted, covering her embarrassment with herself, then let her anger flare up again.

"But we must gain the knowledge this one holds!" That is to say, she herself wanted it, wanted it badly, so as to hopefully regain her missing powers and make short shrift of those she felt were an impediment to her and her plans to rule the Sith.

And through them, the Galaxy.

Which included just about everyone in said galaxy.

She snorted again, segued that snort into a black snarl.

"What do you suggest we do now?" she finally asked, sheathing her sword even as she sent a longing glance Phalomir's way. It would be so easy, too easy; would such an opportunity ever come again? The sword paused a fraction in its sheathing, before continuing on its way, finally finding a resting place along the halfling's back.

"He knows you were speaking to him, he does not know that it was Panthar who struck him, and I do not think he knows I am even here at all. Perhaps my presence can be something to surprise him with at some later date; I leave it to you to explain to him just why he was placed in the position he now finds himself."

Giving the others a final glare, she turned in preparation of going back into hiding aboard Preon.

[ 12-30-2009 03:12 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by ShaRhylla ]

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I had no real perception of how long I had walked in a daze through the forest. Hours, perhaps days had passed, for my eyes simply did not follow day and night. My entire life, as long as I could recall, the world had been tinted in so many various spectrum that the simple coursing of light through the canopy was dimly blinding.

But even my disorientation would come to pass. I wandered, circling in a spiral outwards from the Ewok settlement, perhaps a mile or two distant now, though it could have been ten, for all I kept track. My reverie was broken by the sudden roar of weapons-fire, the sudden stench of burning coming quickly thereafter.

I paused, staring into the trees the separated me from the settlement, and things began to come back to me. I had not come here alone. What our purpose was I could not recall, but Graysith, Phalomir... they were still out there.

I slowly started down a mossy slope of boulders in the direction the wind came from, carrying still that burning scent, and began to run through the forest, cutting between the house-sized trees that seemed to dominate the planet.

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She paused, her eyes shifting down upon Phalomir's listless form. Her look actually turned into one of disgust. "As for him," she growled, actually stepping near to him and squatting. At first one might think that she was about to once more play the role of a nurse maid,, but as she turned to the bandage she had tightened about his wound, Shayla ripped it from where it had been placed. "We only need him alive for the moment, to tell us what he knows, but most certainly not in the greatest health."

She stood, holding the bloodied bandage almost like a banner. "He believes what I have told him, or at least he did." she ammended. "For all he knows he was attacked by an animal, or something else. I think he most certainly needs to thus suffer even more damage to render him in need of our most tender care.

"All that we needed is the proper scapegoat."

--------------------

She shot the obstinately silent Panthar another glower, and was about to reply when a distant noise came into her attuned half-Sith ears.

"Someone comes," she said tersely, meanwhile bending her knees slightly, ready to move quickly in any direction should quick action be required of her.

"This might be the other humanoid your sensors picked up."

She quieted then, focusing her hearing upon the surrounding forest, through which something or someone was quickly approaching.

[ 12-30-2009 04:55 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by ShaRhylla ]

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I wound my way through the woods, for despite the sudden loss of my powers, I was still in incredible shape. There was a small rise ahead, from which smoke rose. My pace slowed to a trot and I slowly clambered up the slope on fingertips and feet, keeping the lowest profile while still moving at a decent pace.

I came atop the rise, and froze as my eyes fell upon those who my eyes had not lain upon in so long.

Shayla, whom I had long presumed either dead or injured by my ambush when she had so fool-heartily attempted to follow me from the palace.

A Sith, whom I could not recall the identity of, though his bulk made for an intimidating enough figure in this setting.

But the figure who held my gaze in the strongest way...

"ShaRhylla..." I whispered. Though we had last parted with scorn between us, she still held my heart with a fist made of nails.

Slowly I rose up from my somewhat stalking pose, and came to stand, placing a foot upon the crest and stepping into the glade, silent, for I knew not what stone I just had overturned.

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Rykounagin!

Of all the people in the entire galaxy, in the entire multiplex of universes that existed in the Great Out There, he was the last one she ever expected to see again.

He left her... abandoned her, left her behind in that base on that moon, or asteroid, what was it? She couldn't remember although the memory should be seared into her brain, emblazoned within the cytoplasm of every cell in her body... but simple shock flung the memory beyond her recall. So all she could do was remain stone still, aware now more than ever of her lack of powers, wondering fleetingly if he yet possessed his own, wondering if she should attack him, or if he would attack her.

So many quandaries, accusations; too many questions seeking answers... and she suddenly found herself completely without the ability to even begin voicing them. Let alone move. And deep within her, that darkling evil yet entwined around every iota of that which she was yowled in pain, aware that a possible glimmer of light might be readying itself against it. Scrabbling, it reached out, finding her heart, and there fought mightily to squash a tiny bit of warmth which seemed to be taking seed therein.

[ 12-30-2009 05:21 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by ShaRhylla ]

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...and something dark glimmered in them. "Stay where you are!" she hissed softly, something occurring to her even as adreline coursed through her system. "Or have you come to finish the job?" she ended, keenly aware of her dark blond hair bairly brushing her shoulders, having grown back mostly after her near-death experience at his very own hands.

[ 12-30-2009 05:35 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Shayla Stargazer Petrolu ]

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My eyes broke from her only for a moment as the other woman shifted, gaze flickering over the hand that had gone to meet steel, though it remained shrouded for now.

My tongue parted my lips for a moment, flicking over to bring some moisture to the sudden dryness, and slowly raised a hand to the level of my stomach, palm facing downward, fingers open.

Ignoring the warning from the woman, I slowly stepped closer, first footfall creasing the grass and dirt gently, pausing there for any sudden motions that might betray a hostility from them. Then again, and slowly but surely again, crossing a third of the distance towards them before coming to a pause, the whitening of knuckles upon the handle of the blade indicating that no closer should I come just yet.

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I-- I should be joining her in this! The thought finally burst into her consciousness, tearing its way through the shock and lending movement to her muscles. She straightened, her own hand at first flickering towards her back...

...only to settle quietly at her side. Shocked, she found the figure of Rykounagin to be turning blurry, strangely wavery around the edges, until with even more shock she found the distortion to be caused by the tears suddenly forming in her eyes. Unwilling to show any admittance that they were there she refused to wipe them away, but instead shook her head angrily.

Angry at him for first taking her heart then seemingly casting it beneath his boot.

But angry at herself for finding that it really did not matter. Inside, the Darkness yowled, scrabbled, sought to harden her heart, to fill her mind with blackened soot and the morass of deception. She struggled, her body swaying just the tiniest in the only indication that there was indeed a battle raging within her.

Struggling, she found voice at last. The word forced itself up a dry throat, through equally dry lips.

"Rykounagin..."

One hand left her side to momentarily lift toward him, wafted toward the fallen Phalomir, and then dropped to settle back where it had formerly lain. In close proximity to it, the Tooth of S'slan glittered with promise.

[ 12-30-2009 05:58 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by ShaRhylla ]

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"Nothing good can come of love, only pain..."

She trailed, her eyes falling on Phalomir for a moment then growing dark. At length, however, she looked up once more, her eyes piercing the frame of Rykonagin and for the moment remaining thus.

[ 12-30-2009 06:18 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by Shayla Stargazer Petrolu ]

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The words flashed like lightning through ShaRhylla, bringing back another torrent of memories, those of an earlier experience concerning her first introduction to "love..." which, of course, simply wasn't. But those memories served something of a useful purpose, for in coming to her mind they brushed through her inner Darkness, reminding it of the truth in the statement, and strangely enough, satiating it.

She was used to pain, relished it, in fact.

"I don't care," she rejoined, the words spilling out in scarcely a whisper, aimed at both the fuming blonde and the white-haired man standing before them.

--------------------

My gaze slowly shifted between the two women, their words having greater meaning than perhaps a passive observer could have known. In this moment, perhaps, would lie the foundations of more than just the next shared meal.

Slowly I took another step forward, my other hand raising with the other, one slowly pointing out to my left, towards Shayla, the other, before me as I slowly walked towards her.

"ShaRhylla-" I paused, now within arms reach. "I do... I do care."

--------------------

And him.

"R-rykounagin..." she breathed, all air then escaping from her body in a quick little chuff, a sound which broke the locks upon her body and set her free from frozen shock. It did not take long to run those short steps to where he stood upon the small rise, but though she came afront him with startling rapidity, something held her from throwing herself against him.

Rather, she came to a sudden halt mere inches in front of him, looking up into his face, now held higher above her for his position on the slope.

"Why did you leave me?" she whispered, her voice too low for anyone but him to hear the heartbroken words which tumbled from her lips.

--------------------

...although she perhaps soon would be. Her eyes froze on the pair who stood so closely for a long moment, that something screaming deeply within once more.

She didn't ignore it quite as much as she had in the past. But she could only spare a moment to attend to it, and her attentions focused on ShaRhylla and Rykounagin once more.

And she would fault her mother for feelings such as these, feelings she too has but has just managed to bury inside...

With effort, Shayla loosened her grip on the hilt of her sword, but only slightly. She spared one more brief moment to shift her eyes to Panthar, who stood there in bewilderment. Something of distrust glimmered deeply in her eyes, in his direction yet not directed at him, and she once more locked eyes on the pair before her. Something deep within practically expected him to suddenly strike out...

...but at whom exactly, she wasn't quite sure.

--------------------

"There is no excuse." I finally breathe out, reaching out, fingers barely brushing her cheek, seeking the physical proof that she is there, and that all of this is not some brutal manifestation of a malevolent imagination.

"But not again... never again." I whisper.

--------------------

Her eyes, lidded from sheer ecstasy, flew open and she clung for a moment to him, staring off into a blind spot behind his back, taking momentary reassurance from the sound of his beating heart.

Phalomir.

"Phalomir," she whispered in apparent non sequiteur. She drew back a bit so as to gaze up into his face again.

"Are-- are you with him?" she breathed in the quietest of voices, that breath then catching in her throat out of anxiety over how he might respond.

[ 12-30-2009 07:10 PM: Message edited 1 time, lastly by ShaRhylla ]

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