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In the most ancient of days, it was said that visions and dreams were sometimes conduits for those that could sense the universe beyond its crude, physical existence... that they could become catalysts through which the will of the Force spoke to able and willing minds that could hear its call.
Dreams, visions, prophecies, all names for the same thing; a visualization of abstract and esoteric sequences. To some, these were purely symbolic, holding no true inner-meaning aside for the benefit of self-reflection and meditation. To others, they were messages to those with the clarity to interpret them, granting the wise knowledge of things to come. Still more would have their peers believe that visions from the Force were simply too arcane to fully understand, too susceptible to misinterpretation.
Whichever the case, Force Visions were rare, usually bestowed upon the most keen and sensitive to the beckoning of the Cosmic Force. But at times, greater or lesser, the Force would work in ways mysterious even to the Jedi and the Sith. At times, the Force would tremor and quake, speaking its cryptic complexities to those that would "listen" to it...
"Where do you want me to start?"
She had been to this room before. Countless times, in fact. The soft and warm ambient color in the room, like a perpetual sunset shining in through shaded windows. Aside from being in a vibrant rainforest or teeming jungle, there was no better environment to meditate and meld with the Force, deepening one's connection to it. One could scarcely guess they were on a starship in the cold void of space.
"From the beginning. Tell me what you saw, from the first to the last."
And now, here she was. In a session with one of the Order's masters. Half of her, if not most, wanted to get up and leave, frankly embarrassed that she was essentially asking for one of the Jedi Generals simply because she had a bad dream. But there was still a vestige of reason in her mind that knew what she saw was something beyond a mere dream. It was something more, something greater.
"I understand," Anastasia began, folding her legs as she closed her eyes.
Meditation could serve many needs, it was a staple skill to be honed by all Jedi, regardless of their specialization. In Anastasia's case, it helped her to refine her memory, to return to the closed passages of her memory to draw out details she otherwise might have ignored. She was going to go through with this, then she wanted to remember all of it, everything.
"Can you see it?"
A brief silence passed as Anastasia inhaled deeply, letting her head fall before lifting it to face the ceiling, until she slowly leveled it again.
"I see it."
"What do you see?"
"I see... space. Stars, novae and nebulae. I feel the coldness, but at the same time, I feel the warmth...."
"Do you see anything else? Anything at all?"
"Yes... I see a hand appearing, rising out from the void. It reaches high above, as if grasping for something, but... but then it stops. It holds something, but not with its palm or fingers. There are three spheres, three celestial bodies."
"Describe them, now. Don't leave anything out."
"I see a star, a sun, bright and powerful. It gives its power to two worlds, one circling the other, and the other circling the one. Both circle the sun in-between them, live twin worlds. All three float over the reaching hand, rotating over it. But.... but something is... something is changing."
"How is it changing? What happens next?"
"The two worlds circle the star, but now they become stars themselves."
"Then the nature or message of the vision is changing. Keep going."
"I see the first world become a sphere of darkness. I see shadows and night in nightmarish form. It breathes, it grows. It is wrath and passion, but cold and desolate. And it hungers... it hungers so much, that it is like pain and suffering made manifest. So it consumes, it devours to sate its hunger, but nothing quenches it. It feeds, and it feeds, and it feeds, growing and expanding until it consumes all that it can see, and all that there is. I see man and beast drawn into its grasp, unable to escape it. I see the ground drawn up, as if it were a black hole, crushed and annihilated by it. I... see oblivion. The destruction of all and the silence of life. But... then it changes."
"How does it change?
"I see the second world, and it become a burning light. I see fire and brimstone, like a white flame unbounded. The air around it scorches and burns, spiraling about like a maelstrom. It is so intense, searing even, but the harshness... is not there. It teems with the life of a mighty torch, burning, shining as it glows. It chases after the shadows, wherever they are. Where one stands, it makes to fall. Where something rises, it burns it away. There are no shadows in its gaze, no darkness and no gloom. It will not have it, so it purges all that brings shadows to birth until there is no dimness left. I see the brilliance of a rampant light. I see its glow... its own cleansing fire."
"Is that all that you see? Does your vision end?"
"No...", Anastasia slowly opened her eyes, bringing her gaze to the master-general, "This... is where it begins..."
[fancybox2]
[/fancybox2]
"GRAAAAAHHH!!"
Seven moons watched the skies. Seven eyes gazed blow. Like witnesses in the dark, they shed their light for the long night of war. Through the storms and beneath the rain, within the winds and in the flashes of the lightning's berth, blades of light clashed in the glow of the many moons.
"AARRRUUGGGG!!"
It was the symphony of echoes... of screams. Screams of battle. Of a Sith charging with his blade held high, ready to cleave the life from his enemy. Of the rattle of the death throes, gasped aloud as a Jedi fell to the mud below, life extinguished and body broken. And the countless screams of pain. Pain from slashes of the lightsaber, as the searing edge cleaved through supple flesh and adamant bone.
"YEEUUGGGH! AAAUUUUHHHH!"
Their suffering was their entitlement. Their convictions were the blood of their purpose. And their outcries had become their dirge. A dirge that would be sung for the long one hundred years of the century. The rain had become like the tears of the Force itself, the skies weeping in the wake of a great slaughter that would forever mark the beginning of many more to come.
In was in the midst of the great melee, of the battle on the threshold of darkness and light, that Anastasia fought in the tides of an ever-shifting battle. Mud stained her formerly adorned attire as her feet sunk into the ground. Her body twisted as she sidestepped a Sith using Djem So's Falling Avalanche strike. Taking advantage of her momentum, the Jedi Knight deflected the Sith Warrior's blade to the right with her own right blade, using the warrior's force and strength against him. Simultaneously, the Jedi warrior tightened her left hand into a fist, tensing the muscles in her left arm as she plunged her left lightsaber gauntlet's blade into the Sith Warrior's side, impaling him with a Shiak through the side of his chest.
The Sith Warrior gasped in agony as his life faded and his body fell to the tarry mud. Time moved as if it had been slowed for Anastasia, if not stopped. The battle was being fought with increasing intensity, but it was as if every blade had stopped whenever she looked to them. Blades remained locked, arms raised, legs in motion, but all was still to her eyes. It was something surreal, something she could not explain, but the experience, as abnormal as it was, was not registering as being strange to her.
She inhaled sharply, and with a single Jung, deflected a blade again as she swiped a crimson lightsaber blade that had been descending behind her, only for her to again use the Shiak, impaling the Sith through his stomach with her left blade. With her right arm now ready, Anastasia delivered a forceful strike to the Sith's neck, assuring his death, before kicking his body away to be forgotten in the mud.
"Anastasia!", a voice yelled from the chaos. Although she did not recognize the voice, somehow she knew who it was. It was her leader, her master... her commander.
"Anastasia!"
"Master Kaskus," Anastasia said, blocking a red lightsaber again before kicking another Sith away, running to her master's call, "I hear you, master. You cannot be sounding the retreat now―we cannot relent here! There is too much at stake!
"I know exactly what is at stake, child! That is why you must listen to me―now! We cannot know whether the Dark Side or the Light shall prevail this night, but we must be prepared, and on all fronts. Go now, into the temple. I have already summoned Knight Akosi. You will fight alongside each other. Protect the temple, defend it from the Sith―it must not fall into their hands, Osiris!"
Anastasia could feel the pulse quicken in her veins as the conflict within her grew.
"Master I cannot lea―"
"This is no time for your pride, girl! You are to be the last time of our defense. You and Siweo―you mustn't fall! She should already be on her way, now you must join her! Hold the line, repel the enemy! Go!"
Without another wasted moment, Anastasia fled, swathing through the terrain of muck and the dead as she charged for the temple's outer sanctum. The hour was late, but the dawn had not yet arrived. She had a duty to perform, and Force-willing, she would not fail. The temple was behind Jedi lines already, reaching it was only a matter of distance, not opposition.
A red flash came, and with its passing a head flew through the air, leaving a body to drop lifelessly to the ground.
"Kots Jidai!! Châts asha!!"
A woman with blackened eyes and blistered skin stood amongst the dead, standing atop a small pile of dead Jedi Knights. She was aged, withered by all outward appearances, but wielded deceptively great power. That was why she among those who led. That was why she was counted the among the strongest.
They were the evolution of the Jedi, the next natural progression of their brethren's devotion to the Force. The Dark Side was the strongest of all things, and the only future for wielders of the Force. The Jedi were either soon to follow, or soon to fall. For the Sith would tolerate nothing else.
"Hadzuska koshûjontû!", the Sith woman yelled out as if her voice were poison and bile. In short order, several Sith Warriors broke from the fighting, gathering around their mistress.
Lady Pravum, one among the several Sith spoke as they all knelt, "What is thy bidding?"
"The battle for the temple is taking too long. Our progress is too slow and I would not have this dragged out for the fortnight of the beginning. Send the swiftest among you to Kadeous and Sena Rhen. Remove them from the lines, I have new orders for them. They are to be dispatched behind the enemy; slay them, elude them, it matters not, but they will enter the temple and prepare it for our arrival. I will not see the Jedi fortify themselves within before we swing out killing stroke."
"As you will it, my Lady."
Without another word, two of the Sith messengers were dispatched into the battlefield, one after Kadeous, the other after Sena Rhen. There was no option of failure, nor refusal. The fall of the Jedi was inevitable, and the Sith would be the instruments. The two Sith were champions among the crusaders, and with the Dark Side at their command, would be the harbingers of the Jedi's end.
Dreams, visions, prophecies, all names for the same thing; a visualization of abstract and esoteric sequences. To some, these were purely symbolic, holding no true inner-meaning aside for the benefit of self-reflection and meditation. To others, they were messages to those with the clarity to interpret them, granting the wise knowledge of things to come. Still more would have their peers believe that visions from the Force were simply too arcane to fully understand, too susceptible to misinterpretation.
Whichever the case, Force Visions were rare, usually bestowed upon the most keen and sensitive to the beckoning of the Cosmic Force. But at times, greater or lesser, the Force would work in ways mysterious even to the Jedi and the Sith. At times, the Force would tremor and quake, speaking its cryptic complexities to those that would "listen" to it...
"Where do you want me to start?"
She had been to this room before. Countless times, in fact. The soft and warm ambient color in the room, like a perpetual sunset shining in through shaded windows. Aside from being in a vibrant rainforest or teeming jungle, there was no better environment to meditate and meld with the Force, deepening one's connection to it. One could scarcely guess they were on a starship in the cold void of space.
"From the beginning. Tell me what you saw, from the first to the last."
And now, here she was. In a session with one of the Order's masters. Half of her, if not most, wanted to get up and leave, frankly embarrassed that she was essentially asking for one of the Jedi Generals simply because she had a bad dream. But there was still a vestige of reason in her mind that knew what she saw was something beyond a mere dream. It was something more, something greater.
"I understand," Anastasia began, folding her legs as she closed her eyes.
Meditation could serve many needs, it was a staple skill to be honed by all Jedi, regardless of their specialization. In Anastasia's case, it helped her to refine her memory, to return to the closed passages of her memory to draw out details she otherwise might have ignored. She was going to go through with this, then she wanted to remember all of it, everything.
"Can you see it?"
A brief silence passed as Anastasia inhaled deeply, letting her head fall before lifting it to face the ceiling, until she slowly leveled it again.
"I see it."
"What do you see?"
[fancybox2]
[/fancybox2]
"I see... space. Stars, novae and nebulae. I feel the coldness, but at the same time, I feel the warmth...."
"Do you see anything else? Anything at all?"
"Yes... I see a hand appearing, rising out from the void. It reaches high above, as if grasping for something, but... but then it stops. It holds something, but not with its palm or fingers. There are three spheres, three celestial bodies."
"Describe them, now. Don't leave anything out."
"I see a star, a sun, bright and powerful. It gives its power to two worlds, one circling the other, and the other circling the one. Both circle the sun in-between them, live twin worlds. All three float over the reaching hand, rotating over it. But.... but something is... something is changing."
"How is it changing? What happens next?"
"The two worlds circle the star, but now they become stars themselves."
"Then the nature or message of the vision is changing. Keep going."
[fancybox2]
[/fancybox2]
"I see the first world become a sphere of darkness. I see shadows and night in nightmarish form. It breathes, it grows. It is wrath and passion, but cold and desolate. And it hungers... it hungers so much, that it is like pain and suffering made manifest. So it consumes, it devours to sate its hunger, but nothing quenches it. It feeds, and it feeds, and it feeds, growing and expanding until it consumes all that it can see, and all that there is. I see man and beast drawn into its grasp, unable to escape it. I see the ground drawn up, as if it were a black hole, crushed and annihilated by it. I... see oblivion. The destruction of all and the silence of life. But... then it changes."
"How does it change?
[fancybox2]
[/fancybox2]
"I see the second world, and it become a burning light. I see fire and brimstone, like a white flame unbounded. The air around it scorches and burns, spiraling about like a maelstrom. It is so intense, searing even, but the harshness... is not there. It teems with the life of a mighty torch, burning, shining as it glows. It chases after the shadows, wherever they are. Where one stands, it makes to fall. Where something rises, it burns it away. There are no shadows in its gaze, no darkness and no gloom. It will not have it, so it purges all that brings shadows to birth until there is no dimness left. I see the brilliance of a rampant light. I see its glow... its own cleansing fire."
"Is that all that you see? Does your vision end?"
"No...", Anastasia slowly opened her eyes, bringing her gaze to the master-general, "This... is where it begins..."
APOTHEOSIS
[fancybox2]
"GRAAAAAHHH!!"
Seven moons watched the skies. Seven eyes gazed blow. Like witnesses in the dark, they shed their light for the long night of war. Through the storms and beneath the rain, within the winds and in the flashes of the lightning's berth, blades of light clashed in the glow of the many moons.
"AARRRUUGGGG!!"
It was the symphony of echoes... of screams. Screams of battle. Of a Sith charging with his blade held high, ready to cleave the life from his enemy. Of the rattle of the death throes, gasped aloud as a Jedi fell to the mud below, life extinguished and body broken. And the countless screams of pain. Pain from slashes of the lightsaber, as the searing edge cleaved through supple flesh and adamant bone.
"YEEUUGGGH! AAAUUUUHHHH!"
Their suffering was their entitlement. Their convictions were the blood of their purpose. And their outcries had become their dirge. A dirge that would be sung for the long one hundred years of the century. The rain had become like the tears of the Force itself, the skies weeping in the wake of a great slaughter that would forever mark the beginning of many more to come.
In was in the midst of the great melee, of the battle on the threshold of darkness and light, that Anastasia fought in the tides of an ever-shifting battle. Mud stained her formerly adorned attire as her feet sunk into the ground. Her body twisted as she sidestepped a Sith using Djem So's Falling Avalanche strike. Taking advantage of her momentum, the Jedi Knight deflected the Sith Warrior's blade to the right with her own right blade, using the warrior's force and strength against him. Simultaneously, the Jedi warrior tightened her left hand into a fist, tensing the muscles in her left arm as she plunged her left lightsaber gauntlet's blade into the Sith Warrior's side, impaling him with a Shiak through the side of his chest.
The Sith Warrior gasped in agony as his life faded and his body fell to the tarry mud. Time moved as if it had been slowed for Anastasia, if not stopped. The battle was being fought with increasing intensity, but it was as if every blade had stopped whenever she looked to them. Blades remained locked, arms raised, legs in motion, but all was still to her eyes. It was something surreal, something she could not explain, but the experience, as abnormal as it was, was not registering as being strange to her.
She inhaled sharply, and with a single Jung, deflected a blade again as she swiped a crimson lightsaber blade that had been descending behind her, only for her to again use the Shiak, impaling the Sith through his stomach with her left blade. With her right arm now ready, Anastasia delivered a forceful strike to the Sith's neck, assuring his death, before kicking his body away to be forgotten in the mud.
"Anastasia!", a voice yelled from the chaos. Although she did not recognize the voice, somehow she knew who it was. It was her leader, her master... her commander.
"Anastasia!"
"Master Kaskus," Anastasia said, blocking a red lightsaber again before kicking another Sith away, running to her master's call, "I hear you, master. You cannot be sounding the retreat now―we cannot relent here! There is too much at stake!
"I know exactly what is at stake, child! That is why you must listen to me―now! We cannot know whether the Dark Side or the Light shall prevail this night, but we must be prepared, and on all fronts. Go now, into the temple. I have already summoned Knight Akosi. You will fight alongside each other. Protect the temple, defend it from the Sith―it must not fall into their hands, Osiris!"
Anastasia could feel the pulse quicken in her veins as the conflict within her grew.
"Master I cannot lea―"
"This is no time for your pride, girl! You are to be the last time of our defense. You and Siweo―you mustn't fall! She should already be on her way, now you must join her! Hold the line, repel the enemy! Go!"
Without another wasted moment, Anastasia fled, swathing through the terrain of muck and the dead as she charged for the temple's outer sanctum. The hour was late, but the dawn had not yet arrived. She had a duty to perform, and Force-willing, she would not fail. The temple was behind Jedi lines already, reaching it was only a matter of distance, not opposition.
[fancybox2]
[/fancybox2]
A red flash came, and with its passing a head flew through the air, leaving a body to drop lifelessly to the ground.
"Kots Jidai!! Châts asha!!"
A woman with blackened eyes and blistered skin stood amongst the dead, standing atop a small pile of dead Jedi Knights. She was aged, withered by all outward appearances, but wielded deceptively great power. That was why she among those who led. That was why she was counted the among the strongest.
They were the evolution of the Jedi, the next natural progression of their brethren's devotion to the Force. The Dark Side was the strongest of all things, and the only future for wielders of the Force. The Jedi were either soon to follow, or soon to fall. For the Sith would tolerate nothing else.
"Hadzuska koshûjontû!", the Sith woman yelled out as if her voice were poison and bile. In short order, several Sith Warriors broke from the fighting, gathering around their mistress.
Lady Pravum, one among the several Sith spoke as they all knelt, "What is thy bidding?"
"The battle for the temple is taking too long. Our progress is too slow and I would not have this dragged out for the fortnight of the beginning. Send the swiftest among you to Kadeous and Sena Rhen. Remove them from the lines, I have new orders for them. They are to be dispatched behind the enemy; slay them, elude them, it matters not, but they will enter the temple and prepare it for our arrival. I will not see the Jedi fortify themselves within before we swing out killing stroke."
"As you will it, my Lady."
Without another word, two of the Sith messengers were dispatched into the battlefield, one after Kadeous, the other after Sena Rhen. There was no option of failure, nor refusal. The fall of the Jedi was inevitable, and the Sith would be the instruments. The two Sith were champions among the crusaders, and with the Dark Side at their command, would be the harbingers of the Jedi's end.
