|
|
Post by Alkor Centaris on Aug 23, 2014 9:56:56 GMT -8
Iterating the story of what has gone on during Alkor's seeming disappearance from the Galaxy.
Authored by myself, and those who choose to enter into the story with my permission.
All occurrences will be considered canon for all involved parties, all interactions will be within the site rules.
|
|
|
|
Post by Alkor Centaris on Aug 23, 2014 10:30:07 GMT -8
A snap and sinister hiss, and the hellish blade took form. In the darkness that surrounded them, Kata Aran watched her dreams twist into nightmares.
It had been so simple, finding freedom from the codified rule of the Order. Taking the teachings of old C'thulu, Pyros, Reign- all the Guard in all their glorious tragedy- and putting them to her own selfish uses, Kat had created for herself a life of luxury. Men she wanted, and women too, fell at her feet, hopeless to resist her influence in the Force.
But that had all passed. Her contentment had devolved into a maddening scrape for fulfillment, not to be sated by such material things. In a world plunged wholly into darkness, they had been taught, there is no hope for ending the hunger. What had set them all apart from Sith was a willingness to temper their endless search for wholeness with self control. And Kat found that, in this hour beyond the end, she had none.
None of them did. Perhaps they never had. It would explain why brother went against brother in a thoughtless, loveless war. It would explain why they had rendered themselves extinct. In the death throes of a once great order, men fought to preserve the memory of their establishment with heroic acts.
In the end, it had been damned to die.
"Who are you?" She asked with a shaking voice, though if the wraith heard her, he did not show it. Bathed in the bloody light of his weapon, his ghostly white skin looked demonic. The tip of the blade pointed accusingly toward her, down- where she had fallen, pitifully- condemning her.
"Rise," he commanded in a short, emotionless voice. "Arm yourself."
She faltered. "I will not be commanded by you," she spat, though her attempts to feign authority broke like waves upon jagged rock. "I will give you money," she suggested, realizing he was not swayed by her manipulation of the Force across his mind. He was no paltry forceful.
"I have no need of credits," he rebuked. "Rise. Have you no respect for what you once stood for, to become so debased and twist it so?"
Kata had become angered at this. Whoever this man was, he knew of her past. He spoke as one of the Fallen Jen'jidai might have, of honor and of respect. "You revere a dead tradition and mock me for moving past it. Does that not make you just as much a fool? Power, then. I will give you power."
"From your knees, you offer me power? Woman, you know nothing of power. You talk too much." He moved forward and twisted his wrist, sending a quick thrust of crimson plasma toward her face. In an act of desperation, she called on the Force to aid her. Swirling blue energies wreathed her hands and warded off the deathblow that would have ended her life, shunting the blade away.
"Witness true power," she hissed, as the mystic energies around her hands warped into streams of electricity that arced toward him. The robed man staggered back, catching the brunt of the burst on his weapon. Pops and crackling of breaking o-zone cried out like a sadistic orchestra, and the hooded figure fell to a knee as Kat rose and encroached on him. She pressed her onslaught wickedly, the mad gleam in her eye thirsting for more carnage. "Power!"
Alkor felt his hood fall away, his unblinking violet gaze set on her golden eyes. Her lips turned up in a satisfied smile as she watched him grit his teeth in concentration. The Dark Jedi felt his eyes roll backward as the intoxication of the Dark side roiled all around him, but he did not give himself over to its lull. "You lost your way," he muttered, and there was defeat in his sagging shoulders.
Kat exploded with rage. "I have lost my way?" She screamed, the lightning from her fingertips extinguished. "I live, and you are at my mercy. Who is lost, Jen'jidai?"
"The one who believes themselves at the end of their struggle," he said without satisfaction, the red blade sinking into her throat. Alkor caught Kat on his shoulder and supported her weight, pressing the blade firmly, deeper into her until it was buried in on side and fully exposed on the other. He turned her face toward his own so he could watch the light leave her eyes. "We are all lost. We have always been."
She could not make the words, but he could feel them ebbing from her mind in the Force. Why? I was free of this... I had my own path...
As she died, Alkor extinguished his blade and let her limp form fall to the floor. "Because. The old way must die. Nothing can come of the corruption that tore apart my brothers."
He left her in silence, a freedom she had secretly sought for so long.
|
|
|
|
Post by Alkor Centaris on Aug 23, 2014 11:00:47 GMT -8
Leaving a villa on Taris with a fresh corpse left Alkor with a strange sense of disgust. Years of hunting enemies had rendered him mostly indifferent to the sensation of killing; his ambivalence was toward killing those who, at one time, he had called allies. Not truly friends, but the closest thing he had ever gotten to family. Seeing a Dark Jedi so thoroughly devolved steeled him, however.
His data pad rang with a low alert, signaling it had found another lead from the old archives. He had linked the database to a secure, Jedi-employed Republic database, thanks to the Watchmen. With knowledge of known order members and a solid Republic registry, it was easy to sort out where people were, and how to find them.
His AI simply searched for ones who involved themselves in shady activity. Dealings that were frowned upon, or even just simplistic enough to draw attention. Many Jen'jidai prided themselves in discretion and aloofness from society- it had been a facet of their order, being set aside for so long that they made no plays in galactic games- but there were those who did get their hands dirty. Of the ones left over after the purge, they would be the easiest to find.
Alkor sighed, quieting the beeping with a quick press of the mute button. He took a long drink from his flask, then let out a huff. Names, faces- all disjointed, broken memories- played back through his mind like a video recording. The curse of Force given glimpses was that they existed outside human parameters. Even if he did not remember, the Force did.
It was not a joyous thing he did. "Something troubling you, Captain?" Alkor glanced up to see Jefra, his first mate, standing not very far from him.
"How long have you been following me?" He did not look amused. It was his explicit directive that no one be aware of his movements outside the ship. Alkor Centaris was to be considered, for all purposes, dead. Those who knew his secret kept it confined within the walls of his ship.
"I know you're hunting them," he said. "Dark forces. Sith. You're doing good for the galaxy, Alkor."
He quieted Jefra with a gesture. "No," he said. "I'm fulfilling an agenda. I'm not doing this for the damned galaxy. The Republic, the Imperials, they can all burn." Jefra gave a questioning look. "I believed in something once," he told his friend, "and I learned that it was a lie. I hate liars, Jefra. I hate them."
It was a difficult admission. Alkor had lived most of his life the most incorrigible liar of all. "I'm cleansing the galaxy of the remnants of that lie. That's all."
Jefra shrugged. "I don't know what the hell you're talking about," the man said in earnest, "but if it kills renegades and evil force users, I'm all for it."
A simple man. Alkor respected that about him. "You know," Alkor admonished, "I'm not what you'd call a "good" force user."
"Sometimes men do bad things for the right reasons." Alkor had to laugh at that.
"Come on," he said. "We're bound for the Core, now."
"They hide in the strangest places."
"It helps them stay alive longer." Alkor smirked. "But it can't save them forever."
|
|
|
|
Post by Alkor Centaris on Aug 24, 2014 14:23:10 GMT -8
Alkor reclined in the captain's chair of the "Ashen Tide" lazily while his crew hurriedly prepared to drop out of hyperspace. "Cap," came a rough, older male voice from the left side of the room, "I got a confirmed ID on your friend."
The Jen'jidai rested his head on his hand and closed his eyes. The speaker continued. "Apparently, he's involved with some pretty occult business. The Republic has investigated them multiple times, each without enough sustainable evidence to tie them to any illegal activity. As far as they're concerned, he's got a veritable and credible religion popping right up from under him."
Religion? Yes, perhaps some of the older, more fanatical believers might have gone for something like that. It wasn't too far of a departure from what the Black Guard once subscribed themselves to. "See what you can dig up in the darker corners of the HoloNet," Alkor drawled, his seeming boredom apparent. It afflicted this crew when he showed his darker notions. The indifference with which he addressed assassination chilled them visibly, and he had learned to mask his true intentions in the earlier stages of their time together. "If I'm to see Tremo again, I ought to at least show some respect for his chosen life, no?"
Tremo, while he had only ever met the man in passing, had been something of an enigma. A lesser, more devout and indoctrinated acolyte in the Black Guard, Eversio had never called on the man directly for any manner of action. There had been very little love lost between them, apparently, because Tremo had sided with the rebellion and left quickly in the wake of catastrophe. Alkor had done something similar, when he reflected upon it, but gone back to survey the ruin for himself.
He had never heard Reign's words directly. It was through his gifts in the Force that he heard echoes through the tide of time, and watched in subdued sadness as the Sage took his own life. The body was gone, Alkor had reflected, and though he had strained to see where it may have gone, the path had been obscured. Reign's post mortem fate was lost, but his message remained.
His violet eyes danced over the frontal glass of the command deck as Talus substantiated before them, one of the Five Brothers of the Corellian system Alkor had once been condemned never to return to. Memories of the past did not plague him; Alkor had little interest in what came before. He owned who he was, and no one else. That was a tenet of the Old Guard- rule yourself, that no one else would ever rule you. Alkor still kept that advice like a faith of its own.
"Report to me on all your findings," Alkor commanded curtly, rising with abrupt haste from his seat. All pretenses of calm were shattered, and his grave purpose filled the room. Spines straightened. Hairs stood on end. All eyes watched Alkor as he left.
The black hood fell over his head once more as he clamped his eyes shut, and he began to mentally prepare himself for the coming storm. This would not be like the ordeal on Taris. One of the Black Guard would be a challenge to defeat. Killing them would prove the least satisfying thing he had done in many years.
He found his chambers and seated himself in lotus on the floor, taking in a deep breath. The Force flooded him, try as he might have to resist the urge to press it away. In a moment where man and universe became one, it was pointless to deny what either was.
Even if it meant that, far below, eyes turned toward the stars...
At last, my brothers have come for me...
|
|
