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deercountry2021-12-08 08:42 pm
a_gaggle_of_ghosties) wrote in deercountry2021-12-08 08:42 pm
Entry tags:
December Catch-All
Who: Darth Nox and anyone unfortunate enough / determined enough to encounter a Sith Lord.
What: What it says on the tin. Catch-all for December, particularly the event.
When: Throughout the month.
Where: Various locations throughout Trench.
Content Warnings: Body possession, Violence, Murder, Mass Murder, human experimentation (both discussion & execution), lingering trauma.
Additional prompts and/or content warnings will be added as necessary.
[For the Winter Mourning memories of Ziost, they will be broken into smaller prompts in the event you don't want to subject your character to the entire thing. Each prompt will be numbered in the format X-Y -> Z, with each letter corresponding to a numbered part of the linked playlist.
X being the start of the memory, Y being the current stage of the memory, and Z being where the memory will eventually lead.
Of course, if you want your character to experience the whole thing there's nothing stopping you from just using all the prompts, but at least this way it should offer people an offramp or two before it reaches the worst parts. There's a reason he remembers the entire ordeal, after all.]
What: What it says on the tin. Catch-all for December, particularly the event.
When: Throughout the month.
Where: Various locations throughout Trench.
Content Warnings: Body possession, Violence, Murder, Mass Murder, human experimentation (both discussion & execution), lingering trauma.
Additional prompts and/or content warnings will be added as necessary.
[For the Winter Mourning memories of Ziost, they will be broken into smaller prompts in the event you don't want to subject your character to the entire thing. Each prompt will be numbered in the format X-Y -> Z, with each letter corresponding to a numbered part of the linked playlist.
X being the start of the memory, Y being the current stage of the memory, and Z being where the memory will eventually lead.
Of course, if you want your character to experience the whole thing there's nothing stopping you from just using all the prompts, but at least this way it should offer people an offramp or two before it reaches the worst parts. There's a reason he remembers the entire ordeal, after all.]
Winter Mourning: Ziost, 1-2 -> 6
That call would be the harbinger of the single greatest loss of life the Empire had ever known. Ziost had been considered the Gateway to the Empire, even one its crown jewels, but once planetside it quickly became apparent the Sith behind the distress call had drastically understated the severity of the situation. The sprawling metropolis of New Adasta was just one of many killing grounds in a planet-wide massacre.
Bodies littered the streets in numbers large enough that it actively discouraged anyone from tallying the dead. Whether they were charred beyond recognition, shot to pieces, or buried under rubble, there was just no end to them. Several corpses bore the characteristic signs of having been cut apart by a lightsaber blade, while others belonged to those unfortunate souls who had murdered through more creative methods: Impalement, smashed to a pulp by one of several escape shuttles or other craft shot out of the sky, there were even some who had been tossed to their deaths from the city's upper levels.]
I'm curious. When you decided to stick your nose where it didn't belong, was this what you'd hoped to find?
[Even as one Nox raced through the city with his apprentice in tow, trying to stem the slaughter wherever he could, the real Darth Nox had taken notice of another mind linked to his own and come to investigate. He didn't sound pleased, but he sounded a good deal more disgusted than angry. He'd already lived through it once, could anyone really fault him for not being excited at the prospect of going through it yet again?]
no subject
[ what a terrible act of violence. senseless destruction. obi-wan could never understand what could be gained from murdering people weaker than you. how does it prove power or strength of any kind? it just seems . . . so pointless. ]
This place has a habit of drawing our memories out without much say so.
no subject
[Jedi weren't much for lying--usually--but he also made no efforts to disguise the fact he was trying to get a read on Kenobi's mind in an effort to find any hint of deceit...not that it would have done him any good if Kenobi actually wanted to hide it.
For a Sith who'd mastered so many obscure, notoriously difficult aspects of the Force, Nox was surprisingly terrible at using some of the more basic abilities. Like telepathy.]
Welcome to Ziost, I suppose. I hope I don't need to explain that none of this is normal.
no subject
The scale of it, certainly.
no subject
[It isn't long before Memory!Nox has pacified the area around the shuttle platforms, at least temporarily, and finally heads toward the city proper with apprentice in tow. And considering Nox wasn't in any hurry to find out what would happen if he or anyone else lingered in an area past the point his past self had any knowledge of it, he motions for Kenobi to follow as he moves to follow himself. Literally.
He had a feeling that was never going to stop feeling weird.]
But, not to worry. Republic forces will be here to make the situation immeasurably worse before too long. And for once the Jedi won't be accompanying them, though I never did find out why. If I had to guess the reason, I'd say Theron made a private holocall to the Grandmaster and advised against it.
no subject
[ and dismissing it that way is callous. it could have been a village, it could have been a planet. the egregious, wasteful loss of life is terrible. and it's never a numbers game. ]
And I think to some degree, you know that.
no subject
[And frankly, even if this were a Republic world his response would have been the same. A battlefield was one thing, for one reason or another everyone there had made the decision to take up arms. The wholesale slaughter of civilians wasn't something that sat right with him, especially given the Empire's many thoughts on the supposed benefits were unsupported by any real observable results.]
My only intent was to give you time to prepare. Time you will either use wisely, or squander by continuing whatever it is you think you're accomplishing here. Whatever your choice, I will not be shielding you when the time comes.
So choose carefully.
no subject
And what is it you're preparing me for?
no subject
All life on this world will be extinguished and its essence consumed in order to both restore and dramatically increase the Emperor's already considerable power. The Force will all but disappear from this world and all that will remain of this world will be rubble and ruin.
[And a few surviving Sithspawn, but Nox had a feeling Kenobi would be happier remaining ignorant of just what sort of unnatural monstrosities the Emperor could just will into existence.]
And you will feel every last agonizing moment of it. Millions will die as all their final moments of terror, all their regrets, and their final moments of collective terror will echo through the Force as a unified, deafening scream. Because I will fail, and that is the cost of my failure. If we cannot find a way to unlink our minds before that moment comes, that is what you must prepare for.
Winter Mourning: Ziost, 7-8 -> 10
The arrival of thousands of new vessels for the Emperor's mind had, as expected, made an already terrible situation worse. Now he had to fight not only through possessed Imperial assets, but through the Republic personnel who'd fallen under the Emperor's sway as well. The end result was that there was little he could do in this sector to rescue any survivors. There were just too few of them left to be found. The ones he did find either refused to leave their hiding places or were already in the process of being possessed by the Emperor.
Electrocution was all it took to put a stop to the process for the latter group, but Nox couldn't afford to personally escort them to safety now. The best he could do was ensure none of the Emperor's puppets were left standing in his wake and hope the path back to the shuttle pad remained clear long enough for them to make it to safety on their own. And it only meant that he moved that much slower toward the rendezvous with Agent Kovach at the power station.
Once there, however, it was apparent that Nox had still somehow managed to arrive sooner than expected. At least for Kovach. It was doubtful the man had intended for a member of the Dark Council to walk in on his secret call to the Supreme Chancellor of the Republic. Of course, while the Nox in the memory waited and listened in on the conversation, the real Nox once again appeared next to the uninvited guest whose mind was linked with his own.]
Useless little worm. If it were any other situation, I'd have cut him in half and had the pieces delivered to Saresh's office as a warning.
Winter Mourning: Ziost, 11-13a -> 17
Well, that, and sheer desperation. Though he wasn't sure how to feel about the fact the Emperor continued to allow him to venture planetside without any interference. He certainly wasn't pulling any punches once Nox was actually on Ziost, and if the Emperor had wanted to take over New Adasta's defense grid to blast his shuttle out of the sky there was little Nox or anyone else could have done to stop him.
Even with a schedule to keep, Nox was still trying to save any civilians he could find amidst the chaos, but by the time he'd actually reached the tower he'd had to force himself to stop. The Emperor had evidently decided to turn his efforts into a cruel game, allowing the Sith to save Imperial civilians just long enough for them to have hope of survival only to snatch it away at the last moment. The Emperor let them enjoy the hope of escape before taking hold of their minds as he'd done with what felt like half the planet, then forced them to turn them against their former rescuer. One way or another, the Emperor would get the deaths he needed.
And, if the two Jedi now taunting Nox and his apprentice were any indication, the Emperor was all too willing to repay Nox's barbs in kind. Considering he'd just provoked the bulk of the city into coming for his head it wasn't as if Nox had any time to spare, but it was apparent he'd have no choice in the matter. The Jedi--and the Emperor pulling their strings--were between him and his objective. That meant they had to be dealt with.
Nox didn't waste any time, disappearing from sight only to appear again behind the Twi'lek in flash of lightning to strike the first blow--the Jedi had blocked his strike well enough, but staggered forward as Sith lightning traveled up his blade and coursed through his body--and for her part neither did his apprentice. Ashara might not have been capable of utilizing the same techniques, but she was an exceptionally aggressive duelist in her own right. Unusual for a Jedi, to say the least, and that might have been why she was able to put her own opponent on the defensive so effortlessly.
The real Nox wasn't taking part in the fighting of course, he already knew it'd be a waste of time and effort. His own memories couldn't see him or his "guest," which gave him reason to doubt that he could influence events in any way. No, the most Nox could do was just watch. And he may as well make the most of it.]
This may be the most useful this experience has been. I can't say I've ever had the luxury of witnessing my duels from an outside perspective. If nothing else, it should make identifying any shortcomings that much easier.