Unto Nothing, Part II
Posted on Tue May 5th, 2026 @ 9:49pm by Kelderesh jai Nektus & Verse
4,050 words; about a 20 minute read
Chapter:
Chapter IX: The First Verse
Location: Unknown, Cult of Axion Enclave
Timeline: Unclear - after Sleheyron
OLD
Kelderesh began to pace, eyes fixated on the chrysalis with a burning passion that demanded he know more but he also knew the tricks of the dead. They envied the living and this ancient unnamed Sith might simply wish to see him perish and fail in his mission.
"You want me to touch this thing?" he growled, the claws of his bare feet scraping the stone as he twisted this way, then that, "You think me a fool? Why would I trust a spectre who won't even name themselves?"
The reply he received was not another statement from the ancient Sith's voice, but rather the giggles of what sounded like a little girl from behind.
"You're funny!" she said sweetly. When Kelderesh whirled around, he saw a young blue Nautolan girl in a long yellow sleeveless sundress perhaps no older than five or six in equivalent human years, and clutching a stuffed furry white doll that looked like a cute cartoonish version of Mange complete with glowing red eyes and a patch of red blood staining the fur under his mouth. Her feet were dangling over the edge of a nearby table she sat on, legs casually swinging back and forth as she regarded the big bad Kaleesh. On one of the legs, a bloody bandage was wrapped around it, and her head had a patch in the same spot where Nala had cut into Amare's head.
The girl waved innocently at him after he locked eyes with her, and happily greeted, "Hi! I'm Zaracoda! Is Uncle Archonus being mean to you? He's a big mean huff n' puff, but I think he likes you. Do you want to be my friend?"
NEW
Kelderesh was genuinely stunned. His eyes gazed wide at the girl who had apparated into the chamber, then back to the blue embryonic woman in the fluid sac. Staring into her features and then back at the infantile Nautolan. While he was not attuned to the Nautolan developmental stages, he was fairly certain he was staring at a younger version of the subject before him. Or, at least, some kind of projection of her.
He did not answer her question, instead casting his gaze upwards, as though he would see an unseen puppeteer hidden on the ceiling.
"Spirit!" he demanded, "What trickery is this? I ask for answers and you merely play with me. I am Kelderesh jai Nektus and you will submit to me!"
"Shhhh!" Little Coda gently hushed Kelderesh with her index finger over her lips. "Don't yell so loud. Daddy is sleeping on the floor and the bad pirates might find Mommy."
A flash of memory shot into Kelderesh's thoughts of a Nautolan man dead on a starship deck with a fresh smoking blaster wound to his chest. A blood curdling scream of a woman in the distance was heard and faded out quickly. The vision of a teenage Zaracoda was seen holding the murder weapon with trembling hands with horror written all over her face. Standing behind her appeared to be none other than Axion himself placing his comforting hands on her shoulders.
Had to do it...it was the only way, came Amare's voice in Kelderesh's head. Sacrifices must be made for the ones we love. This is the way of the Force.
"Amare told me you might be mean too," Little Coda said, disrupting and ending the memory. "Mean people don't get to learn nice secrets." She clutched and affectionately hugged her stuffed toy albino Wookie friend. "He's very bad, isn't he, Mangy? I'm so happy you're not hungry anymore. We're friends now!"
She gleefully giggled and made a soft playful "raaagh!" sound feigning an attempt to bite his head off with her tiny sharp baby teeth, but she gently kissed his head instead and combed the synthetic white fur there with her hand.
Kelderesh stepped towards the young girl, eyes shifting around suspiciously.
"I see..." he announced, a clawed hand waving broadly in her direction, "This is some kind of intermediary vision through which you communicate."
He straightened his wrapping robe, "Very well. This fish will bite."
Crouching down slightly, he cocked his head slightly towards the infant, "Mange can be a good boy when he wants and a very bad boy when he gets angry. A lot of the people here are angry, even me sometimes. But it is only because I want to be... smarter... healthier..."
He squinted quizzically, "You understand me?"
The door to the chamber swung open along with a plume of fog, but no one entered. Kelderesh's attention was stolen by the open door with the distinct scene of the outdoors that did not belong to the planet he knew he was on. From the corner of his eyes, something else was missing: the entirety of the chrysalis and his Nautolan captive, as if she wasn't even there. When the Kaleesh sorcerer turned back to young Coda, she was gone.
Kelderesh rose again gazing at the thick mist seeping from the doorway into the chamber that he now stood in alone.
"More visions from a fragmented mind..." he spoke faintly before stepping forward and through the doorway.
On the other side, he was greeted with a craggy landscape, with rocky spires piercing the sky swamped in the same fog that still twirled about his robe. Hanging in that sky was a terrestrial planet of greens and blues, but wrapped in a shroud of purple sky. The light from its surface reflected a ghostly violet-hued illumination towards where he stood, which bleached everything it touched, turning the moisture in the air into a thick blanket that obscured the route ahead.
Yet, he did not need eyes to see that something lay ahead; it tried to obscure itself in the Force and yet, hungry eyes could not hide their dark thoughts from him. This place was bathed in the dark side.
He set a talon-like foot forward and clenched the dew-laden, yet chalky earth below his feet. Then another step. Each one offered no resistance, as though welcoming him forward with eager anticipation. He pulled his weapon from beneath his cloth belt and surged it to light, warding off the deathly violet with his own dusty vermillion hue that punctured further into the haze.
As he continued forwards, the craggy landscape began to transform in a dream-like fashion - melting from rockface into thin, spindly trees that struggled to thrive in the barren soil. The pale light began to wane as the planet overhead fell away and his pale red light began to dominate. In its glare, he saw glimpses of wide, reflective eyes peering from the trees. Not moving. Only watching.
He was not unnerved - he had faith in his powers of the Force and the strength Axion had taught him of the blade.
Then, just ahead, he slowed as the entrance to a cave began to loom like a starving mouth tunnelling towards him. Against the darkness of the cavern, his blade illuminated the silhouette of someone. The figure moved and he again caught sight of familiar head tendrils.
Once more, another projection of the Nautolan stood before him.
He halted, bringing the blade up in front - not in defence, but in an attempt to illuminate her form more. The darkness resisted his attempt, however.
"So, to what place have you brought me now?" he asked, his breath parting the mist before him as he spoke, "Clearly, the spirit that dwells within you is powerful and knows I am worthy of its power. So, speak and let us do away with these distractions."
"This isn't a distraction, Lord Kelderesh," the Nautolan phantom retorted. She brought her left hand up and ignited the ambient Force energy that fueled their link together within the hidden dwelling of her mind. Amare's face became illuminated in haunting astral flames, as did her loose black Sith robes with a risqué plunging neckline that scarcely revealed some skin of her chest and the silken fabric was lined in crimson red piping and esoteric sigils from a dead ancient language.
Her eyes flared in a similar color when she added, "This is revelation hidden beneath a veil. The child you saw was a part of me that I've tried to kill multiple times, but she is...undying. The Light is not so easily extinguished, so I've learned to live it. Though I'm glad she's here. That part of me is the only thing that is keeping me sane right now. Your Cult is nothing short of barbaric...and I respect that."
She gestured her flaring hand to a part of the cave floor revealing the materializing forms of Zaracoda and a grievously wounded Thane.
"This is where it happened," Amare explained as they witnessed the scene of Amare using her incredible regenerative power, the moment playing out before them in total silence. "The day my powers truly began to awaken. Before you and the others in the Cult slaughtered him on Sleheyron, I saved Thane of Caanus from certain death on a moon called Vaa. Outside, you witnessed the Vaa-Thaalda. Minions of another undying fool, Darth Cabal. To this day, I don't know what came over me, but I kissed Thane, drank in the poison from his body, and the dark side took over and I healed him. This is the power of Dark Transference. Rejuvenation, as you can see, is not exclusive to the Jedi."
"Dark Transference..." Kelderesh narrowed his eyes as he stared at the confident Nautolan vision before him, stripped of her bodily weakness yet still aware of her diminished resistance to his master's influence, "That is not a technique owned purely by your Sith. I have studied what fragments there are that still document it, though I have never reproduced its effects."
His eyes fell to the thick, surging energy that poured between the memory of master and apprentice, repeating again, like a holodisk stuck on a loop.
"An unreliable salve against death," he continued, voice considering and rough, "Too tied to emotion and only ever recorded as an externalised ability. The dying cannot save themselves. This is unacceptable."
He clenched his fist, "No, the power I seek in you is that which I saw when I brought you to the brink of death and before I brought you back from it. That fluid, that chrysalis, that..."
A word came to his mind, unprompted, "...Azoth."
In the faint light, Kelderesh thought he saw her smile.
"Come, we must go further into the sanctum if you are to learn that which you seek," Amare gestured towards the gloom that was as black as the space between galaxies. "Your master will soon take hold of this part of me. He will be privy to all my memories soon, but he cannot cross nor see beyond the vestibule I have built. When the Sith teach you their secrets, the lessons come with particular ways in which the knowledge is safely engraved into the mind. It is not a spoken method that is learned, but rather felt and formed by instinct and connection to the Force."
Compelled to follow, Kelderesh stepped forward towards the dark cave mouth. His feet kicked up dry dust onto the memory figments on the ground and they vanished into the ground. Their story played out.
As soon as he reached the threshold, the darkness sped to meet him - surrounding him. He looked back to see more darkness and when he turned forwards again, he was in a furnished study. Old and dusty but, in the gentle glow of candlelight, it held a warmth to it. To his left, a tall bookshelf stocked with real, physical tomes of varying sizes with yet more littered on a low table beside it. To the right, an alchemical workstation, where a Naal thorn burner gently heated a round bottom flask filled with a bubbling amber liquid. The vapour rose into a distillation column and delicately dripped into a beaker.
And ahead of him, now in front of a large stone fireplace, the Nautolan once again stood. Hunched over and seemingly weary.
"More locations," the Kaleesh sorcerer remained unfazed and irritated, "Why do you waste your power to show me this? I will follow you no further. Tell me what I seek or I will leave Axion with little more than a husk to play with."
"You can of course leave anytime you wish," Amare said. "Although, it would be most unfortunate for you if you departed without my blessing. The Vaa-Thaalda outside stand within the gloom behind you. They followed you in, and you never sensed it. They are, after all, me, and you are in my trap. You can try to hurt me, but I will end you in kind."
A previously enshrouded part of the room became illuminated revealed two high-backed chairs resembling lordly thrones made of the finest most polished brylark wood adorned with ornate tapestries, one with the sigils of Axion's cult, the other inscribed in Sith heraldry.
Amare gestured to the chairs, "Or you can be seated and hear my proposal. After which, you can accept or deny, and I will leave you free to go and do as you wish. I may be Sith, but I have my own principles, and my word is my oath."
Kelderesh angled his head just slightly back. He could indeed feel the hungry eyes behind him; waiting and watching. He had no idea if he could be wounded or die in this vision state but the risk lingered all the same.
He did not submit in word, but drew his robes closer and paced forwards, taking a seat on the throne beside Axion's sigil.
"What you seek from me is not something I can easily give, voluntary or otherwise," Amare explained upon gracefully taking her own seat. "Whilst you and your colleagues gleefully tore the Jedi on the space station to pieces over Korriban, I was on the surface, exploring my Sith inheritance and was given this...thing. The lingering spirit of an ancient, a Sith Pureblood named Darth Archonus, wounded me close to death with one of his giant pets and used strange devices to infuse this substance, this Azoth into me. Those devices are gone now. To remove the substance by force would ruin its potential. I don't understand its true purpose yet, only that Archonus said he hoped it would rebirth me into a goddess just to prove that his work had value after being forgotten for thousands of years. I think he was wrong...or he was lying. Listen carefully: when I form the chrysalis, it forces me to experience the traumatic feelings of death each time, and it never gets easier. It cuts your bodily functions down to the brink before pulling you back, and it leaves you vulnerable to the outside world, doesn't even spare the dignity of keeping your clothes intact. That does not feel like a path to divinity. It is transformation, yes, but to what...that is an unknown I need to reveal. And that is where you come in."
Having listened intently, Kelderesh began to nod slowly, eyes thoughtfully flicking to the floor and then back to the woman.
"This substance, this Azoth, might not be the ultimate power I seek, but it might serve to extend my life long enough that I might discover true immunity from death. Axion has his own ways and I will serve him faithfully for the chance at sharing in it, but I require an assurance that will protect me should he decide I have served my purpose. For that, I would be willing to strike an accord with you in this form and not what Axion will soon make of you."
He drew himself up in the seat and flexed his talon-like fingers outwards in the air between them.
"What would you ask of me?" he queried, openly.
"I implore you to become my master in the dark arts of your cult," Amare proposed. "I sense that my Sith master is truly dead, and therefore Axion has proven the superior one to serve. I wish to accept Him and serve His will with all my ability. No reservations. No half-measures. Full commitment. In turn, you teach me how to properly wield the dark side of the Force as a true sorcerer would, and I will do my part to help you unravel this mystery inside me, and together we'll learn how to properly pass it to you if you still wish to take on the risk with me. We could transform together, become something more, perhaps even surpassing Axion himself; or Archonus was truly a fool and it could be the death of us; or perhaps the coin could land on its edge, and something could happen that defies anything we could possibly imagine. The decision is yours."
Kelderesh listened, his yellow eyes interested while the other hungry eyes in the darkness kept their distance. When she had finished, he leaned back, bringing his fingers back together and rubbing his palms, still smooth from the healing transfer he had initiated back in the chamber.
For a moment there was silence. The gentle crackle of the fire and the soft bubbling of the alchemical mixture gently stirred the pressure in the air.
"What you need," the Kaleesh answered finally, his words precise and considered through his accented voice, "Is your own assurance. Right now, you are Axion's favoured plaything but, when the dust of his victory over your old master settles, you will be just another thrall - one of many hands that, when weighing him down, he will sever without a moment's thought."
His eyes rose to the crimson banner bearing Axion's sigil, "So, what must you do? You make yourself invaluable. Make it so that removing you would weigh him down more than your persistence. For me, I do this by seeding his influence in others - by training initiates in his name in the places where he cannot always be. You too, I think, have much to teach if you were willing."
Amare couldn't help but gawk incredulously at the idea the Kaleesh sorcerer was suggesting.
"Me? Become a mentor? For one of your recruits?" She chuckled, thinking the whole idea ridiculous, but then Kelderesh's hard stony gaze indicated that he wasn't speaking in jest. "Wait, you're serious? You're suggesting I train someone...with what? My Sith knowledge? My own powers were turned against me on Sleheyron by Glynt and Nala, not to mention how easily Nala beat me on Korriban, and that was after I received the Azoth. What makes you think I am worthy of such responsibility? Wouldn't Axion take slight over me teaching this acolyte things that are not of the Cult? I have no clue about your rules or rituals."
Kelderesh let out a sharp cackle before ending it as quickly as it had erupted with a slap of his palm on the armrest. The creatures in the darkness began to hiss in response but he ignored them and leaned inwards.
"Worthy?" the robed cultist repeated the word, "You still do not understand, child. Worth has nothing to do with it. Axion grants great boons, but do not mistake them as accolades for loyalty or adherence to doctrine. He does as it pleases him according to his own unknowable wisdom and, everything else, you must simply claim... or else be claimed."
His claws tapped a restless pattern along the brylark wood. She was not worth the risk, but the power inside her might be.
"I have, under my influence, a recent initiate of the cult: a promising young Muun. Soon she will need to be assigned to a sect," He leaned in, eyes narrowing, weighing her reaction, "I could make the case that she be assigned as your disciple. She would fall under your protection and you, in turn, would fall under mine. I care not what you teach her; there is no curriculum in the cult - you either rise or you fall. But it would grant the opportunity you seek: to learn more of the esoteric powers of the Force, while you, in turn will allow me to study the Azoth within you."
Kelderesh's words stirred, ebbed, and flowed through the torrential chaos of the Nautolan's mind. A few breaths later, and she slowly rose to her feet and sauntered ever so casually towards her guest. Slowly, her face shifted from a stern look of doubt to a contented contenance bearing the faintest hint of satisfaction when it dawned on her that this had been opportunity that she could capitalize on. If Thane was truly gone, then the Rule of Two dictated that the Sith Order be reestablished with a master and an apprentice. If this Muun was not a spy, and someone she could truly shape into one of her own design, it would mean she would have someone she could trust within Axion's wretched hive of scum and villainy. On the other hand, it could easily be a trap, or a means to setup Amare for failure.
"Very well..." she said with a slow, thoughtful nod and a trailing tone to her words. She then raised her left hand and snapped her fingers...
When Kelderesh opened his eyes, his hand was still reaching towards where the chrysalis had been, only now it was gone. A few paces away was the sultry figure of Axion's captive. He saw the same casual hip swaying stride of Amare just as he saw in their telepathic connection through the Force, but here in reality, there was much more revealed of her, and nothing left to the imagination.
Amare stopped gently in front of him just within arm's reach and smiled at her sorcerous host. She made zero attempts to cover herself, nor did she show any signs of shame. It was a blatant display of self-confidence wrapped within the feminine enigma of vulnerability.
Her blue skin overall was strikingly smooth and covered in the residual dew of Archonus' experimental legacy. Yet, around the rim of her face and the sides of her neck, shoulders and legs, there were signs of mottling and dark side corruption. Her skin tone had altered slightly, too, tinged with a subtle shade of gray, not as bright and hopeful as her previous azure hue. Moreover, the outer protective membrane of her alien eyes became a touch less opaque, and the true eyes that dwelt beneath were more visible than with most of her species.
Kelderesh watched her settle before him, stepping back slightly to give her space as she settled in the space before him. His eyes took in her body, but settled quickly into her dark eyes, glowing faintly with a red energy.
"...I accept your terms," Amare calmly finished her thought from the vision with a slight tilt of her head and added in addendum, "but only on the conditions that you teach me your powers to the best of your ability. In turn, I will train this Muun woman of yours, and you and I will explore this anomaly I carry, but I will not be your lab Ranat. Nothing short of mutual respect as peers, or I will permanently deny you the Azoth. That is the deal. Take it or leave it."
Kelderesh hissed faintly, finding it distasteful that the woman was now adding addendums to their arrangement.
"You will find, Nautolan," he uttered, "That there is far worse in this place than anything I can do to you. But, you have my word that I will do what is in my power to elevate you within Axion's chosen."
He brought up a hand, feeling its smoothness one more time before he once again summoned the beginnings of his stormy lighting to his palm.
"There are, however," he continued, tone more menacing, feeling his flesh once again burning under the heat, "Certain appearances that will need to be upheld and I'm afraid I cannot return with you looking better than when I arrived."
He smirked slightly, allowing the darkness to enter him once again, "If you understand me."
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