The Trial of Treason

Posted on Thu May 30th, 2019 @ 9:53pm by Thane & Bomoor Thort & Amare

4,754 words; about a 24 minute read

Chapter: Chapter V: Unbound
Location: Inside the Mind Prison
Timeline: After "Trial Separation"

OLD

Amare went to her master's side and leaned in and tiptoed up to whisper in his ear with a hand masking her lips, "I feel something...off with that female and the way she's staring at us. Shall I deal with her while you take command here?"

Thane's eyes subtly flicked to the mysterious woman, whom he had noticed had been offering his apprentice more considered and focused glares than to him. Given there seemed to be no small detail that had not received Hazzarah's careful, twenty-thousand year-long consideration, he acceded to Amare.

"Yes," he said simply, walking past and around her so that he stood between the woman and Amare. "Mind yourself with this creature and be mindful of your own recent transformations," he whispered in a hushed tone. "This is undoubtedly your game, suited to your talents and/or pitfalls. You will succeed."

NEW

Amare sauntered over to approach the Sith woman who never averted her yellow eyes away from the approaching High Priestess of Trayset.

"If you have words for me," Amare said with a hard, narrow-eyed scowl and an accusing tone, dispensing with the ettiquette of a polite greeting, "then speak them now." She cautiously moved her hand to the pommel of her short sword at her side which stood-in for where her shoto had been. Strangely, there was no longsword replacement for her master's old lightsaber.

“You are not of this place,” the wispy, feminine voice announced to Amare before her eyes flicked over briefly to watch the departing Archzealot, “We are kin, you and I. Not like the rest of them. Come, come quickly.”

The rusty-skinned woman swept around and shot off through the stone streets of lower Trayset, pausing briefly at the entrance to an alleyway. Looking back with her pale-yellow glare, she beckoned, “Forget games, we shall show you the way out of this Mind Prison.”

She then shot around the corner, clearly certain that Amare would follow.

The lure was too good to pass up, and so with narrowed skeptical eyes, Amare followed the bait like a fish in a pond. Whether there was a hook behind the offering remained to be seen. Her left hand subconsciously slipped close to the grip of her sheathed bladed weapon as she moved around the corner.

"Where are you taking me?" Amare called out. "Where did you go?"

There was no answer but a hushed voice carried on the dry Korriban wind, “I think she can be trusted, sister,” Amare could faintly hear, “She is not part of Hazzarah’s games.”

As Amare moved down the alleyway, she could hear the whispers emanating through an archway that led into a dark, shaded courtyard behind the main street. Two figures were hunched together: one was seemingly the mysterious woman that had beckoned to Amare and the other was unfamiliar but held a similar appearance to the first with the same height and build.

"Indeed?" Queried the second twin, who was garbed more ornately than the first, now circling about the former. Like the other woman, her features were harsh and formed of deep angles and jutting corners, which gave them both a non-traditionally beautiful but striking appearance, only the second's face was carved with ritualistic shapes and glyphs - some of which bore a resemblance to the Builder artwork that adorned the Wraith Box Bomoor was currently tangling with. As the woman twisted and turned, it almost seemed as though her scarred flesh was shimmering an unnatural muted gold. "Sister, I fear you trust too readily; she is a slave to her compassions, a martyr in her hearts."

"I am Sith," Amare interjected from roughly twenty feet away from the twins, the low seething wrath in her voice carried by the acoustics of her surroundings. "I'm enslaved to nothing, and I have no intention of becoming a martyr of anything today. The two of you, on the other hand...that depends on what you have to show me, and you had better not waste my time."

"We have wasted much time within the confines of the masters' glorious prism," the second sister replied evenly, "and met many that named themselves Sith. They, like the rest, are all now ash, forgotten to time - and to Hazzarah, nameless pawns in a game he forgot he ever played with them. You will be no different, if you walk the path he has laid for you." She stepped to stand beside her counterpart, all four eyes set upon Amare's. "We invite you to play a different game, to step beyond Hazzarah's petty machinations. The Mind Prison could be your own, Lady Amare, both within... and without."

"Oh really?" Amare said with a smirk whilst advancing a few careful paces closer. "If it's games you want to play, then give me a droid and I can make it wear a wig and have it play a few rounds of Pazaak with you." She placed her hands on her hips and noted the weapons at the twins' sides. One had a black serrated dagger with a thin, stiletto-like blade mottled with dry blood, while the other had what was essentially a small yet fierce looking club with a barbed metal head. She wondered just how well-versed with their weapons they were, as well as their skills in the Force.

The first sister slinked around Amare, looking her over; gazing through the visage the presented, "You wear your skin well, but does the darkness suit you I wonder?"

Her whispy voice was uncomfortable but held an intelligence, "My sister is wise to question your nature: you are quick to dismiss us, but you should pay attention to every detail in this false world. We offer you the chance to truly conquer this world. Hazzarrah does not control everything in this place; why be subservient to his whims when you can carve your own destiny in this place?"

Interesting choice of words, Amare thought. There was faint itching in the palms of her soft hands as she contemplated a contingency plan. She wondered what happened to other Sith that refused such an offer of escape before. Clearly the sisters hadn't been successful before. "You said others have come here before me. Did you make any of them the same offer?"

That seemed to be an uncomfortable question as the pair shot each other glances before the first sister answered, “We think many have tried before. We would not be the first, but those before us have faded: lost their minds to this place. We still remember; we still have the spark we see in you.”

She came close so Amare could see her face clearly: she did not have any facial markings like her ‘sister’ but she had dark shadow under her eyes and a purple-ish pigment had been drawn on her cheeks, which seemed to be concealing spider veins that crept across her face.

“We would not ask you if we did not see your potential… sister,” she added the last word with a wide smile.

"You find yourself in a dilemma not of your own making, and your fate," said the second sister, "if left to the devices of others, rests entirely in the hands of your two male companions, as it will matter not if you would pass your own inane challenge. Should you harbour any hope of escaping this realm, it is dependent on others having the prerequisite talents to overcome Hazzarah's little games, against whatever childish criteria it is he uses to judge his prisoners." The woman came to stand just beside and behind her sister, and laced her arm around her as she continued to address Amare. "Do you like requiring the strength of others? Do you like trusting in their ability to succeed?"

Amare found the question profound enough to spark a flashback to Lorrd. The words of the lady bounty hunter that befriended her following a harrowing mission to protect a foolish, yet very wealthy client...

"I'm proud to call you 'sister'," the huntress had told her. "You earned it back there. But don't take it as a pass to start getting all mushy with me. That's what men want. They expect us to act prissy, paint each other's nails, and bend the knee to their every nasty little desire. No, you and I...we're badass. We're the exceptions. We're among the few smart enough to rise above that social crap. But I'm gonna warn you about something, and you had best not forget it: never trust a smiling face, especially when it's someone you don't know. If they make you an offer, never take the first one, and always stay frosty and be ready to draw your blaster, or...magic tricks in your case. That goes for everyone...even me."

Amare, as Coda, had taken those words to heart, but it wasn't until her mind and soul had been divorced from her body did she realized the context of their meaning. Here were two strange Sith women she hardly knew anything about from an ancient culture steeped heavily in the dark side of the Force...and they were smiling at her whilst making an offer.

The Sith Apprentice drew her weapon; not her blade, but her practiced face of acquiescence. It had served her well on Nar Shaddaa, and it worked on Yavin 4 when she was bloodied and battered at Thane's mighty hands. It was showtime.

"I loathe trusting my life to others," Amare replied evenly. "Especially men; men that harm us; men that callously lord themselves over women; women who should be standing proudly over them with great power. I want to be more powerful than any man!" She dramatically turned away from the sisters and paced a few steps to their side to consider her next words and build upon her act. It felt to her as if she was playing out her own scene in one of her favourite HoloNet soaps, The Young and the Relentless. The Nautolan used words of misandry to appeal to her audience's feminine pride in an attempt to win their confidence and discover their true intentions. It was true she wanted to be powerful, and was secretly jealous of Thane's power and his bond with Bomoor, but she bore no hatred towards men overall. "I see the wisdom in your offer," she added turning to the sisters with her hammed up acting, wide black eyes almost pleading, her voice starting to lose its fire, and allowing a careful measure of melancholy. "I followed those two males into this place. Even after they abused and abandoned me to a terrible beast, I killed it, nearly fell to its poison, and still I followed them. I...relied on them. I...I think I made a terrible mistake. I-I'm such an idiot. What have I done?!"

"Nothing that millennia of womankind has not done time and time again," the first sister seemed pleased with Amare's performance, but her curious eyes gave no indication of whether she believed the words, "Like a chain, we are bound and that same chain binds us here, even in our minds."

She hopped back, into the shadows of the courtyard so she stood next to her companion, "Then we welcome you, sister. Come and break your bonds with us. You may call me Alarii," she grasped the other woman's hand and thrust it into the air, announcing, "And this is Keryha."

"I am called..." she almost answered with her old name. In her playacting, she had tapped into a part of her former innocent self, and so it took a second of sheer will to stuff the part that was Zaracoda back into its box somewhere deep in her mind. "...Amare."

You had your time, little girl., Amare thought to herself, mentally cursing at the light which still lingered within. You were weak, and you died in the azoth pit. Now I am in charge, and if Thane falls in this simulator, I shall escape and rise as the new Sith Lord. I will become all-powerful!

She wondered if Coda's grasp on her mind was growing since she was separated from her body. An idea came to her that perhaps, after she escaped, there was a possibility to use the Mind Trap to separate her old persona, freeing Amare from her own past, and sequestering Zaracoda forever. The chain would be broken, she would be free, and the Sith Code would be fulfilled! Even darker thoughts came to her, and she considered for but a moment about leaving Thane and Bomoor behind. She could take the Red Raptor for herself and go hunt for more secrets of the Sith to expand her power. Even better, she would have Darth Bane's holocron and all its knowledge to explore at her leisure. Moreover, she would have revenge for the abuse she endured at Yavin 4. The temptation was rapturous, and so hard to ignore.

"Teach me, sisters," Amare said with the pull of the dark side tugging at her heartstrings, her voice returned to its original serious tone, albeit with an added hint of eagerness. "Reveal to me the means of our salvation from this place."

The sisters let Amare's declaration rest in the air for a moment, neither saying anything nor moving. It was Keryha that finally broke the silence, her aquiline features bearing a tentative expression. "You must understand, if you accept this gift - if you take this path - you are dooming your companions to failure within the prism. Either all succeed in the Bastard Hammer's games, or all lose - save you."

"Much as I appreciate it, it's kind of strange that you hold me in such regard," Amare noted quizzically. "Out there, I'm nobody. I was just a girl with a lightsaber and dreams to be free with my brother. I have these powers I never asked for, and yet...I don't think I'm special. Why should I ever matter to either of you? My friends are more powerful than me. They could save this entire city all by themselves, and I would leave them behind...as a traitor. A coward. Is...is that what I'm supposed to be?"

“You sell yourself short,” Alarii let go of Keryha’s hand and shook her head at Amare, “Your so-called friends do not have the clarity you possess. They willingly accept Hazarrah’s game; like so many men, they see it as a challenge they must conquer to prove their prowess. But we see that not all games are won by brute force, do we sister?”

"This war was lost aeons ago, Lady Amare. The Sith of our generation - friend and foe - are dust, and now their name is a mantle for the dark and powerful." Keryha gestured openly to the world around them. "The Ax won; the Bastard became king after him, and the disciples of Soa were imprisoned within our master's own devices, doomed to the madness of reliving our failures." A sly smile slipped over the Sith traitor. "It was mere irony that a cabal of the devout thrust the same punishment upon the Bastard King."

The second sister stepped closer now to Amare, whimsy leaving her voice. "We pine for days past no longer. Our war was lost before ten dozen empires rose and fell through the ages, but it does not mean we - our knowledge, power and aspirations - need be lost, too. We implore you: use our knowledge to claim this Mind Prison, and all the power within. Our masters are extinct and we know little of the universe beyond, only that it evolves without us. We wish to serve a new Mistress, one with whom we can impart our knowledge. Together, we will unlock the secrets of Korriban, of the Builders. We would give you the Relics of the Mongrel Altar, the knowledge of the Infernal Engine; this world - all worlds - could be yours to reshape in whatever image you deign, Mistress of All."

You are better than this Amare heard a disembodied voice that sounded like her father, Capasegno Wolph. It was from an old memory when Amare was a troublesome twelve year-old Coda on Glee Anselm. You are my daughter. I know you'll do the right thing.

Do you not wonder why the Sith of old failed? she then heard Thane cut in from elsewhere in her mind, the aspiring Sith Master's unforgettably painful lesson from Yavin coming back to her. They were malicious fools, doomed to failure by their own greed...that is not who I am. That is not what my Sith will be!

Amare closed her eyes and turned away from the sisters, clutching at the sides of her head. "Stop...stop it!" she yelled aloud at the voices coming at her, believing it as some kind of malicious attack from the Sith women to torment and break her. "Get out of my head!"

The two off sisters watched as Amare shook and writhed as she experienced the apparitions of her past. Alarii suddenly ceased her playful demeanour and took on a more serious, angry tone, “This one is broken and not by Hazzarrah. Perhaps something within her had the spark, but she is too conflicted now.”

And then the most troubling voice of all from a certain Rift Jedi Master...

Amare...let go...swim in the flow of your instincts...see the truth in yourself, and that which you face. Master your dark side, but take solace in the light. The Force is more than power, it is wisdom, and it will guide you when you feel afraid and confused. You must trust in it...all of it.

It was Nakomo...Master Dakris Nakomo, the first Jedi Amare ever killed, and it wasn't a memory. The words were new and direct like he was speaking to her in the moment. There wasn't a speck of anger or vengeance in his voice in spite of what she did to him. Nakomo was the model of serenity and compassion, even in death. Moreover, the old master had never called her Amare before. She had only known him for less than a week between Lorrd and aboard the Silver Sigil, and having watched him meet his grisly fate was like killing her father all over again. As she opened her eyes, she could feel his presence somewhere close by. She wondered if it was possible that he had somehow forgiven her. Of all the undead souls that had haunted her in her recent adventures, Nakomo's was the most welcome of all.

Alarii stepped towards Amare, her eyes now filled with fire, “Let go of your past, let go of those that hold you down. We will offer you this chance once more and then we leave you to decay in body and soul.”

Amare's hand went to her short sword. "No...this isn't right. You're both trying to trick me somehow. You want the bodies of my masters, don't you? And you need my help to do it! Forget it. I won't give you what you want. Thane is mine to deal with at a time of my own choosing. You are enemies of this city! Traitors! Traitors are here!!" She screamed the words out loud as she drew her weapon, hoping others nearby would hear. "Agents of the Builders are here!" With her other free hand, she allowed the Force to engulf it in a scarlet blaze of Force draining hellfire, a beacon of her presence and vicious intent.

Her outcry seemed to trigger some commotion and there was a shift in the air as the power dynamic shifted away from the two Sith ‘sisters’. Alarii hissed sharply, before relaxing her posture and smiling menacingly at Amare, “Foolish little thing. Not fit to be our sister. We will survive, we know his game. But you will become nothing: a pawn now and forever.”

"If I were you, I'd start running," Amare mirrored the menacing smile, unfazed by the pathetic false proclamation thrown impotently at her, threateningly pointing her weapon at Keryha, then to Alarii. She carefully sidestepped around to their flanks, forcing them to turn to track her changing position. "Or perhaps you think you can take wicked lil' me down before the others come for your heads? Shall we find out together?" Then she shouted with haste, "I have the traitors. To my side, quickly!"

Already, the stamping of feet could be heard echoing against and past the walls of the nearby streets, voices clamouring in response to the call from the high priestess.

Keryha glanced around quickly, but hissed as she looked back to the woman that had spurned them. "We were high priestesses once," she warned, "dutiful servants to powerful masters, of wisdom and ambition. They showered us with praise and knowledge, and with scorn, when necessary... but it was not to last. When they were swept aside, when their ambition won out against their wisdom, there was naught for us." The first of Amare's support began to file into the open space, readying their spears, but Keryha did not stop. "They used us and made us feel important, but we were defined by our service to them, so when they were no more, we were left to the crows, with nothing but each other. Our allegiance won us nothing."

“Don’t waste time with this fool any longer, Keryha,” her sister grabbed her hand again, “There is a reason we remain, while Soa and our former kin of the Infernal Council crumble to dust: we do not cling to our titles, our pride; we simply survive.”

"I have no use for such things either," Amare agreed, the idea of titles making her skin crawl, except for the moniker of Sith Lord...that one felt good rolling off the tongue. "I, too, survive out of my desire for the power to set things right in the universe, and take revenge for injustices I've suffered. A real shame it came to this. Were it not for the treachery I sensed in you both, I would've gladly embraced you as sisters. If your bond with me was genuine, I would've returned for you one day, offered you freedom from the prism once I learned to control it. If only you had proven yourselves useful to me." She threw a sidelong glance at one of the soldiers beside her and calmly ordered, "Seize them. If they resist, spare them no mercy."

Amare took no pleasure in the command, felt shame in pressing the lie of declaring the Sith women as traitors. She deeply wanted friends she could count on, greatly craved trustworthy kinship, and desired to love and be loved. It hurt to be disappointed yet again, though each time it happened in her life, she found herself growing colder, and more used to it. The galaxy itself was starting to feel like nothing but disappointment. It needed to change. She needed to change and transcend her limits. She wondered if Alarii and Keryha could ever change, or if they were doomed to remain the same treacherous cretins in the Mind Prison for the rest of eternity.

Keryha's dark expression remained unchanged for all of Amare's words and musings. "Eternity is a long time, child, to live alongside those you have spurned. The Sisters of Sorrow may number two for the moment, but the drag of timelessness will make us three."

Alarii drew a hand up in front of herself and her sister and her palm began to glow with burning purple magic, “I still see it in her eyes,” she spoke of Amare, “In time she shall see we were right.”

Thrusting her hand forward, she cast the purple flames at their feet and a great magical ember consumed the pair entirely, burning away within moments to reveal nothing but the courtyard dust kicked up by their disappearance.

Amare winced and flinched slightly at the vanishing act. She held out her hand engulfed in the illusory flames of the Force to protect herself, and readied herself for a battle which never came. When the magic dissipated, she was alone; no Sith sisters, and a complete absence of her summoned guards. She added this to her growing list of strange illusory encounters.

She didn't understand what Keryha and Alarii were babbling about, but Amare had no time to ponder it further when there came an incredible tremor beneath her feet. A loud and terrible impact was heard in the distance, and immediately the first thing that came to mind was what happened to Thane and Bomoor.

In a panic, she hurriedly ran back the way she came, pushing and shoving with great abandon past other bewildered and shocked civilians to return to the meditation chamber where Bomoor and his Sith acolytes were with the Wraith Box. She had arrived just in time to witness the fabled power of the Box unleashed by the Ithorian's mighty will. She heard his command bellow out through the seismic shifts of the Force around them:

Destroy the Rakata!

When it was over, when the green beams wrought their intended destruction, Bomoor and the others had collapsed. Amare gasped and ran to big alien's side. "Master!" She worriedly placed her hands on him, shaking him in an attempt to jostle him to attention. She thought about what Alarii had said about men and their taking on challenges, how easily her friends accepted Hazarrah’s game as a point of pride. She then started to see tears running from his big eyes as they closed shut, and the distinct feel of the dark side hanging thick in the air all around the room. "What did you do?" she shook him harder, her voice cracking with deep concern and distress. She genuinely feared for his life, and started to feel deja vu from the cave on Vaa, a gravely wounded Thane in her arms, only this time, it was the kinder half of the ex-Jedi heroes. "Answer me!" she cried, tears of her own starting to well up. "Bomoor?! Bomoor!!!"

The fatigued and emotionally weathered Ithorian responded slowly to Amare’s touch, lacking the vigour that usually set him apart from the more sluggish members of his species. However, to all but the three trial-goers, his Ithorian visage was masked. He eventually reached out a hand and grabbed the Nautolan’s shoulder, pulling himself upright against her slight frame until he was on his feet, but still hunched over, as though a great weight was still upon him.

“Coda… you have returned,” he spoke plainly, his dark marble eyes looking over her, as if looking for any scratch or disfigurement in her mind-prison form, “You saw it then? The Wraith Box is unlocked and its curse has washed away the invaders. I hope Hazzarah is satisfied by the exchange I made for this victory.”

For a moment, there was a coldness in his words. Gone were the tears and he seemed to stare through Amare into the middle distance. It was only for the briefest moment before he seemed to focus again, “What happened to you then? Were you with Thane? I feel his is still…”

Bomoor’s legs weakened again and he fell against Amare again.

The Nautolan had to rely on the Force just to keep her Ithorian from falling hard like a marble pillar to the floor, and even then she wasn't able to completely soften his fall without getting herself crushed under his considerable girth. She placed a hand on his hump and closed her eyes for a moment. Satisfied that he was merely unconscious having felt his still-active aura, she rose up and gazed out and inspected the remnants of the battlefield and what was left of Trayset. She had never seen such monumental destruction before, simulated or otherwise, and it was astonishing to think that Bomoor had wielded such incredible power.

She tried to reach out with her mind to find Thane, and she felt something out there, familiar, yet faint. She knew he was alive, but she couldn't tell what his condition was. She shook her head, and felt a tinge of frustration building up inside.

She had had enough.

TBC

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