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[jatazak]

recall

the Jedi Council's reformation on Dantooine and its immediate destruction, duly avenged by our General whom the Lord of Betrayal foolishly left alive.

(she fell to her knees, here - the two Masters to the ground, there and there and there. you retrace the footsteps and lunges, each trace back to its disturbance, inference for the rest.

the majority of the dust here settled during the bombardment. the past-not-present is shrouded all hard-edged, a neat backdrop vaguely embossed with the dead academy,

Master Kai-El worried endlessly back-and-forth on this patch. Kavar had been away in Khoonda, and saw her ship come in. Their bodies would be carried away by Mira and Mical.

Kreia stepped in from the antechamber, with the clean measure of ceremony. Mother couldn't divine why she'd be excommunicated again. Not after she'd gone so far to not be mutilated again. Only to secure her novel strain of ruin.

you step gingerly across the tiles. the grasses sway. the shade-tree droops.)

[jatazak]

2c

"Milady, are you sure you wouldn't have any sort of paper trail? I've written and encrypted the report, but our keyring is a few major versions out of date.

The Sith trooper looks around the well-appointed office from behind a mirrored faceplate. "Also, thank you for the... anonymization measures? But this helmet will go with my kit."

"Indeed, so be it. Your mother has asked after you, but Setesh Rahel’s death is otherwise unquestioned. Well done, dispatching that vagabond we sent you with! I was worried she might be here in tow with you.

Bastila, a martial woman of noble bearing, smiles indulgently. “I have worked with too many urchin magnets in my day." The trooper sets Traya's holocron on the table, her own helmet on the couch.

Under Sara’s eyes are slight dark circles, blue-tinged against the deep red of her skin. She sweeps her hair up in a high ponytail; a radial sigil is shaved behind her ear. “The Republic has most of its droid back. Logistics doesn’t need much specialized hardware, as I understand it.”

Bastila sighs. "Unfortunately, I'm sure Atton will clear things up for Ann eventually. But I'm glad you're taking an interest in Revan's former master."

"I would love to speak with another well-acquainted with the primary source,” Sara pushes, at least showing some ambition. “Perhaps that will clarify the teachings."

[jatazak]

1b

Malachor’s skies are a perpetual swirl of grey and black. you are enraptured, when your shuttle engines explode upon touching a fork of neon-green.

a small constellation of Jedi prospects crawls upon the rocky terrain, lucky to have not landed in a chasm. someone may be screaming. heavy footsteps nearby cut through the wind.

one by one, you draw your training swords, each an identical synthetic bloodshine, left in bulk by nameless predecessors. amidst the fight, you are battered hard, left cowering -

something flings the oncoming monstrosity through the air before its claws catch you. the Master finishes the beast through its eye sockets, sparing the hide.

"You all have survived your first storm beast. Setesh, what have you learned by observing Harper?" you try to gauge Master Visas from the purse of her lips beneath the cropped velvet veil, slowly tightening.

“Jaal, I don’t get it. The Republic’s going to throw me out in a month, and I can’t get Mical to step in as my sponsor. He’s disbanded the whole Infinite Empire research program, you know?”

you can see Harper peripherally, playing at a smile, until a junior faculty saunters over. "Normally we do cull the storm beasts, but it's funnier to let them have the foolhardy students.

Mira frowns. “The older ones that couldn’t learn. Damn weather surprised us. Someone must’ve let the generator maintenance slide.”

“Darling, I did the analysis for him. Reading your papers was a delight, but these rubrics... the attenuation of the Force in proportion to ennui, historically demonstrated in the masters’ ‘loss of divine mandate‘ does not shift the needle, so to speak.”

“I wish I’d stuck to Mandalorian Studies. I mean, I can’t believe people are still fighting that war! But someone should at least read my field notes on the Vong. I can’t possibly publish...”

“We will find a way, to remain together. Believe me that there is a Force bond between us. I will go beyond the Outer Rim to join you, I will take on the duties of an ambassador before I retire to Council...“

[jatazak]

my apprentice loves me, loves me not. discard each petal of the three-thousand-years tetrahedron in turn. recall the cynosure’s wisdom.

there is no dark to become lost to but death. none but the riptide regrets and never-to-bes, the far side of the event horizon.

[jatazak]

1a

"We're very lucky to have the cohort intact. The Order will remember Mira's sacrifice. Another Star Map seemed almost possible... damned savages."

SETESH: They fell upon us, dozens, the moment we got the interface working. Scouts, heavily scarified beneath keratinous growth. Some sort of armor? Strength-enhancing and lightsaber-resistant.

HARPER: They held snakes in their hands like staves. Whips, that lunge. If they weren't vulnerable even to explosive decompression, we'd be done.

"In the interviews, we've got conflicting versions of how they got to the shuttle."

SETESH: My air would've run out. She didn't have to... I...

HARPER: Mira was reviving Rahel, trying to get her up before we had to detonate. The warrior was all smashed, but its snake got her on the calf.

"If this enemy action remains confined to Builder sites in the Unknown Regions... look. Another find like the Star Forge is vanishingly unlikely. We'll win the war some other way."

[jatazak]

the illuminator

the wandering / the foreshadowing running from the scene / manic bloom dead inside / muse don't say a word / sonata arctica

1. our fragile conscience lies awaiting for a war what you're doing, what you do has the logic of a soldier

2. and then the pain i feel, the times i stray would be the slightest regret that i just push away

3. you can bring me back to life, on the outside you're ablaze and alive my skin is warm to caress, i'll control and hypnotize

4. mother always said my son, do the noble thing make me believe it, oh i know you lie

5. (then love-devouring life do what she dare) like fire and powder, which as they kiss consume

act 2 scene 6 / romeo & juliet

[jatazak]

rise the fire hot as to freeze, by searing the nerves before they transmit. its wielder one who boasts truly, both drunken threats and dizzying dreams.

that they are inevitable ends justifies her difficult ends, the illuminator’s work. it is this progress by which rage produces fairness, and freedom defines good.

what nobler crusade than for an adoptive home? what companion more constant than a sensory coprocessor droid? pathfinder, guardian, apprentice...

[jatazak]

what if force powers all scaled off of different stats, like dungeon world splats, or han solo’s force-sensitivity? these sith power gauntlets could give their bonus to force wave and force crush

I enjoy the WIS / CHA crunch in KOTOR II (with CHA not strictly worse, excepting solo content), but the action economy incentivizes any build which starts in STR / CON to also end there.

and I could swear that inflexibility ain’t how Force potential works, let alone getting old and salty and broken-down like the other Masters. (nerfed rests will enter into this charrie’s written economy.)

[jatazak]

mettia sutekh ansegdniss

nameclaiming an Exile because I love this pun too much, and I can't be arsed to file my OC wank out of meta every time. since in-canon scribes (ignoring holocrons as a long-lasting audio record) would naturally produce variant spellings over, oh, 3k years:

mettia, pronomen (given/domestic), poorly-attested in the late republic, perhaps surviving among commoners sutekh, nomen (family), after the god of the desert, an usurper and a protector at turns ansegdniss, cognomen (epithet), old english supplanted by the latin for sacrifice

tria nomina can be taken to structure a nickname to reference (usu.) a campaign - so far, just Sith names, except formally recognized by a certain Republic. cf. @babedur's no-malachor!AU Tiniat Sol(eria), invoking cosmic poetry and the salt-sea dragon-goddess

canon!Exile is best ignored in the first place, granted, but could be admitted as an uncontroversial reading of history? if the 'immortal sith emperor' thing arose as pure morality play, first off Sidious happens anyway, and second off, what can we say by comparison to the Chiss histories and remaining Neo-Crusader sites?

if there is a 'historical readings of Star Wars' niche-within-niche, then @terpsikeraunos, @and-then-bam-cassiopeia are foundational (but I regret not searching 'kotor meta' until now)

[jatazak]

some children grow up despite war. some do not escape, but grow with it.

(or, sabine uses the weapon of her exile against the empire. family supports family. also, ezra tries to help.)

Slight AU, named villain dies. Ezra enabling Sabine, and Ursa too. 753 words.

sabine standing over the empty armor of the emperor's hand's brother, filled with dust, like the some-dozen stormtrooper armors on the level below, like the Clan Wren armors in the wasteland beyond. the darksaber, an instrument of just regicide, fits in her hand like it belongs.

the duchess' sister looks like she wants to strangle sabine again. the weapon hums behind her, its capacitors momentarily expended. in other words, sabine feels right at home. ezra pops up the lift, unhelmed - sabine exhales in relief, to her own surprise, beckons him over. "Come on, let's get this moved."

"Sabine, what-" happened here? you were captured, I'm here to save- "I thought we were here to destroy it?"

"We're here to free Mand'alor, and that's what I'm doing. It's like Fenn Rau said." sabine shoots bo-katan a look - that seems to have shut her up. "We'll be attacked again. But I wonder, what price the Empire would pay now?"

ezra remembers the at-at he walked off a suborbital station using the pilot's hands. knows well enough that sabine is already fighting to justify this escalation to herself, won't mind an excuse to fight someone else.

the plastoid armor of the lesser saxon crumbles into a heap at her touch, suggesting an inefficiency. sabine brushes a stray draft of hair back towards her ear. ezra's hand touches her shoulder, and he doesn't see anything of the lancing arc lightning, the chain of dusted troopers in her amber eyes.

somewhere in the familiar rhythm of taking the weapon core to pieces, mining its walker platform for good measure - defensive purposes only, if the weapon is used again - kanan asks ezra, "What happened?"

("It's not for certain I'll be able to get it back together again - besides no plans, I want to make sure the selectivity is hardwired. It's a stupid hack I used - the electron distribution in plastoid, despite the name..." sabine smirked at ezra zoning out. "There's a reason I waited to correct the last amplification loop."

"You mean, you didn't know only the Imperials would be affected? That's..."

"I've hurt my people today, and it could've been worse. If I hadn't been so stupid-"

ezra shook his head fiercely, "I know what it's like at those academies. There's only one way to excel in that world. A couple, maybe."

"Doesn't excuse that I knew what I was doing. Not with deleting the files, obviously, but every other bridge that I could burn..." sabine's fists clenched.)

ezra wraps the spare goggles around his hands. honestly, sabine's custom scout helmet job is the least of today's losses. "She blames herself, Kanan, for not protecting her family... it's the same trick Maul used, and the Sith holocron. But they're not around, and we are."

kanan looks pained. "Everyone wanders a different desert. Rebels, and Mandalorians, even Imperials. No soldier deserves-" the rest is lost as ezra takes flight. he doesn't use a slingshot anymore, either.

sabine stands with ursa in the private room, the direct line to capitol (formerly the only link to tristan, and Father) within the Wren comound.

"I gave him an opening, didn't I? The other Saxon. You won this from him in battle." but the countess presses the hilt back into her daughter's hands.

"I intervened as a matter of honor. Anyway, I am very much a former loyalist, with a history in the Death Watch, and not terribly popular in Sundari. Bo-Katan, on the other hand, has established her distance from both sordid accounts."

"And she'd erase my mistake just as easily. She made it clear enough that her honor doesn't allow such things."

"However, she cannot destroy our best defense, if you are able to demonstrate your fix as... decisively again. Sabine, you're an artist with any device, even if this one nearly was the death of Tristan and me."

ursa laughs. of course, a kill count would impress her. sabine laughs with her, if only to commemorate the cost of the victory.

(sabine sits with the duchess. she treats it lovingly, her most terrible idea in its first and only incarnation, so that its caress will not touch her people again. sabine layers her new livery in Wren yellow, Spectre orange, and her favorite purple. but imperial grey fits the weapon perfectly.)

the warriors of House Viszla are assembled. sabine passes the hilt on, her eyes meeting flat Kryze emerald, wondering if they once had a burning spark.

bo-katan raises the darksaber aloft, Death standing behind her shoulder. her people cheer.

Well, this ep got me right in the 'Mira's training arc' feels, before I realized Sabine was properly Bao-Dur. Who didn't get an ending, either.

If this weren't comfort fic, I'd have to spend more research time in Kanan's or Bo-Katan's perspective. Imperfection!

[jatazak]

it's really not a disfigurement thing

(alteration brings out the original pattern in relief, doesn't crush but chrysalises! the corruptor doesn't understand)

it's just, the hagravens are honored elders, before they're senile

(so, was it before he promoted you? how long after we met did you decide to curse- don't tell me again, you didn't think it would be dangerous)

you helped me to commit the murder

(well, don't worry, I'll show you dangerous)

[jatazak]

@eldritch-archivist‘s knight-captain seems to be taking a familiar arc with respect to her red wizard.

I haven’t found a good way to eat the gods and keep my friends, either. I have some bad ones though? Seems more appropriate.

you could give safiya to one-of-many deliberately, and it’d go f* yeah that’s hilarious, until it realizes one day that she is not only conscious, but knows exactly how to take power amongst a flock of wolves.

it’s just like when the founder gave any spirit-eater ass before yours to akachi. someday, in an airless place-between-places -

accompanied only by your shadow, a spirit-husk wreathed with peacock-feathers and ram-horns, you hear its child’s lilt drop to a woman’s tones, their familiar measure turned to chaos. and she asks if akachi is free or your slave, now.

you can ask if she considers the hunger to still have been akachi, and she does, so… yes, his diminished form is bound as surely as herself, the founder’s lost innocence. you’ve justly rewarded her complicity in your rise. (while not all aspiring red wizards refuse to learn from monsters or their thralls, it’s hard enough to find sanity coupled with brilliance.)

you can point out akachi was myrkul’s pawn long before you captured him, only to turn his power back to his own ends. you can ask her to rejoin his crusade willingly, empowered with a form immune to time and flexible to her whim. it’s not what she would have chosen, but - a crusade is no time to make children, and there is potential for research collaboration within the gestalt of the many…

but it is kaelyn who pursued the crusade for its impersonal ends. out of anyone, she should have bargained with you. flown away to become the faithless’ shining hope, your mask, as lieutenant of the betrayer. someday she’d admit her fall, but you could keep her from breaking.

yet gann would have the best sense of whether you can actually thread the needle, of your exact propensity to overindulge. he wouldn’t like to see kaelyn oblige you. at best, he can’t trust you, and won’t stay.

you could still just say you buggered up, that your reciprocal transgressions were in fact excessive. but any version of one-of-many will see this as weakness.

Just to riff on the ending (Part 53 in Lt. Danger’s definitive LP) where you end up hunting down and killing One of Many to avenge Safiya, not before it cries out in her voice.

voices of eb, in my tyranny? But it’s weirdly rare for someone to mix the genres and get epic-fantasy bronze-age, i.e. biblical fanfic, or maybe that’s why. :(

We can leave now, just drive away / Only you and me, we could leave today Let’s take a chance, like we used to / We can go back, find something new

still corners - i wrote in blood

[jatazak]

it’s all in place / the times i’ve known / gone a fool to rely on fate the diagrams i’ve drawn / someday you’ll wait / for the moment she appears

i know, i’ll be the one / be anyone, that you want

driver drive faster - can’t afford to rely on fate

[jatazak]

[jatazak]

goblinwasp and crowbear evolutions, iirc

[jatazak]

火鼠

masochistic, nihilistic / urging wrecked up thoughts let me tell you boy / about the lies i lead

atreyu - slow burn

[jatazak]

atyn the radiant, support paladin (of vengeance), chasing a paragon. definitely not addicted to magic, as if her crossbow would hardly work without it.

(psa that neutral evil is the most chaotic neutral alignment)

probably will never catch the murderous Serpent of Many Forms, who is caarth and not jehd azak, shut up they’re completely different