Experiments in the Arcane

[Renfry]

Queen Andruil descended into the deepest recesses of her temple. There was much to do today, and she was excited. Heart pounding and a genuine smile on her face as she continued downward.

The door she arrived at was made of heavy stone. Runes that she had personally designed and placed were all around the doorframe as well as on the inside of the walls and door. They prevented intrusion or breech of the room from the outside, hardening the rock to the point of being nearly indestructible. It was her Vault, where her most protected secrets and items were and where she would conduct her experiments. It was a room that not a soul was allowed access to without her presence.

She reached out to the Shadow, flushing her own power into the runes and attuning them to herself while uttering a single word: Mellon. The doors began to scrape open with the grinding sound of stone-on-stone as she passed the threshold.

She walked inside and flipped a switch, powering up the lights that illuminated the interior. She set Kravos's holocron down on one of the tables in the room as well as her grimoire. It joined the alchemy holocron and the orb of seeing that she had recovered alongside Stolas. Several knives and a plasma cutter sat on another table while another was stained with old but cleaned blood. Above it on a shelf was the head of a Swokes Swokes with rather large hole through the back. It was in a jar filled with preservatives and would be one of the topics to be dealt with today and in the days to come.

She took a deep breath in and pushed up her sleeves.

Time to get started, she said.

 

[Renfry]

She took the holocron from the table and sat on a mat in the corner of the room. Her legs were folded under her and she focused on the holocron. Her eyes closed but clicks and whirs reached her ears as the holocron opened. The former Dark Lord appeared in front of her, and as he spoke, she drank in every word.

Immunity? So that was what the technique had been based on? It fascinated her, and she realized it was one of many things she had never known about the Jedi.

A nexus? This wasn't a nexus, but the entire planet was rife with the Shadow. It clung to this world in ways that few other worlds could match. The Twin Worlds, but nothing else she had seen. She let her mind flow freely. It relaxed and she began to search it.

Every corner of your mind. The thought rang out in her mind. There was nothing to be held back. Nothing to remain unconfronted. It wasn't the first time she had attempted such a confrontation, and perhaps it wouldn't be the last.

Her mind fell immediately to the bleeding of the crystal that now sat in the lightsaber on her belt. Its bleeding had forced her to confront her deepest fears, and she would face them again. "I don't need you anymore, the cost will not be high for me, I can't give you what you seek."

I don't fear you anymore, she said, but she wasn't sure that the words were true. She did fear betrayal. She feared losing Dathomir. She feared the war finding this world. It was only through maintaining her power that she could protect this world. The list of beings with the power to overthrow her were few: the Eternal, Raze, and perhaps Stolas. The former was the greatest threat by far. A being she neither knew nor trusted. She served it as was necessary, but its favor was never guaranteed.

Raze was the one the crystal had tried to cause her to fear. Flashes of concern about betrayal had arisen more than once, but she had never acted on those fears. As more time had passed, she saw the likelihood that he would turn on her diminish. Her power and loyalty would ensure that did not happen. Power he didn't want to throw aside, and loyalty he valued. She knew he didn't love her - a realization that had cut her deeply at the time and still stung - but it was unchangeable. It could not be what she pursued. She had grown. She was no longer the star-struck, foolish girl she had been when they first met. If she still loved him - which she knew in that center of herself that she did - she couldn't allow herself to feel that anymore. Love was more than a feeling, she knew.

And Stolas. Stolas turning on Malicia was something she had not foreseen. While they had always had an odd alliance - and still did - his overthrow of another of Andruil's... former friends, had been shocking. She should have seen it coming. She should have known. The truth was that she still didn't know what he was after. Perhaps it was the Eternal's throne or a throne of his own. She'd rather serve under him than under the Eternal, but once more it required that she remain strong. Indispensable. The moment she lost a step someone would overthrow her.

And that was what she feared. Not for herself, but for her world. Her religion. Her people.

And just like that she was no longer here. Her mind was taken to all that she feared: Dathomir in ruins. Consuming flames stretched as far as the eye could see. The Nightsisters were wiped clean again, their bodies piled high. An occupying force marched across the land and whether it was Sith, Jedi, or someone else no longer mattered.

This is my mind. My world. I am Dathomir, she hissed. Fear turned to anger. She reached out to the Shadow and called down a wall. Slamming into the ground, it was contained.

She walked away, her face twisted into a frown. Fiery rage was behind her eyes. She saw her Clan Mother, throat slit, standing in front of her. Blood ran down the woman's clothes from the gash that Andruil had put there. Another wall slammed down. Anger turned to hate. The memory was shut away inside her mind. A maze created that only she knew that no one else could escape from.

Her eyes glowed green in rage, her body rose into the air above the ground, drawing in green flame to herself before it erupted outward in a burst. It flashed above the entire landscape before it stopped. It formed into runes along the ground, taking shape around her mind. Everything she knew, everything she was, all her memories were encased as the fires began to burn into the ground. From where the fire had burned only moments ago, new walls sprouted. A maze of symbols and runes that twisted a tangled, ever-changing, and infinite path to what she knew, loved, and feared. And hatred turned to power.

With a gasp, her eyes opened again and she was forcibly thrust back into her mortal form. Her breath came heavily and she nearly fell from where she now realized she was levitating above the ground. She blinked several times, her eyes wild with primal emotion, but finally she understood.

Her eyes locked on the holocron and the avatar of the armored Dark Lord.

Your performance is adequate.

 

[Renfry]

It was several more days that she spent hardening her mind, searching herself, and creating her fortress. Coruscant wasn't built in a day, and the fortress would continue to strengthen itself as her meditations continued.

Today was a new day and a day for a new challenge. Kravos's holocron was not simply known for techniques to protect the mind, but also for its knowledge on the alchemical and abominations. Twisting life itself into the unnatural was a technique that was only really sought out by a few.

She had requisitioned prisoners from the Sith who would become her test subjects, but that was work to be done later and likely elsewhere. Today was about compiling information. Once again, the holocron whirred and clicked as it opened to the familiar - and terrifying - visage of the Dark Lord.

She was fascinated as she listened to him speak. Abominations of the original Jedi Exiles were ancient, and the techniques to twist life on a molecular level were nothing short of spectacular. She drank it in as he spoke. She consulted notes she had made from the other holocron as he filled in the blanks. A single piece here or there that she had never fully understood. For the first time, it felt as if the dark side itself was opened to her. For all the power she had held over her life, there were many things she still didn't know.

She knew that blood held power, but it began to come together as she listened, precisely how a being could alter someone or something so completely. Even the mind was broken and replaced, turned animal as they followed their Alpha.

For the first time, she began to understand.

 

[Renfry]

There was an almost school-girl excitement as she got up and moved over to the table. Things were beginning to click, and with that came the enthusiasm of a breakthrough.

She moved over to the bloody table and placed a wooden board atop it, pulling out her hunting knife and beginning to carve symbols into the wood. It would be destroyed when the experiment was over, but until then, it would serve as a means to create the runes for the ritual without destroying the table itself.

It took her several minutes, but with the head present, it would make the summoning easier. The Shaman of the Swokes Swokes would be placed under compulsion, but questioning him would have to be swift.

She opened the jar and gripped the head with the Shadow, plucking it from the jar and setting it in the center of the runes. Green preserving fluid leaked out onto the board and ran into the drain around the table.

She placed her hand on the rune, focusing her power and beginning to speak.

Indep tel epism iwar toth regio, she said, green flame leaping from her eyes and hands. It blazed through the runes as she gazed beyond this world and into the Veil. Among the papers she had taken from his hut, she had found his name and invoked it now, calling to the spirit and dragging it back across the Veil. Not unlike what she had done at Ajan Kloss, but for a slightly less nefarious purpose.

Still, the head screamed using lungs that didn't exist as it was thrust once more into a fraction of its mortal shell. Based on the screaming, she was guessing he could still "feel" the impact of the injuries it had sustained. Lethal injuries, but it was being sustained now by the unnatural.

Tell me about the abominations and I will end your torment, she said, her voice echoing through the Shadow. It let out another screech of anger or pain and she realized that no intelligent speech would come out of its mouth. Not at this point.

She plunged her mind into the creature's... or what was left of it. Its spirit still knew, and there was no world in the galaxy where manipulating and summoning the dead was more possible than Dathomir. She tore through its mind, ripping apart what was left. She saw glimpses of the experiments, the way the living and dead were combined into one being, and the many failures that came first. Even the "success" was still almost a failure. All abominations were twisted, but in this case it had lost so much potential.

Avalach! she shouted through the Shadow, banishing the creature back to where it came from. It once more went limp on the table and she let out a heavy breath, plopping back onto the ground heavily. She felt exhausted. The splitting of her abilities was more draining than she expected, but it was good progress. More learned. More knowledge. And still more to do.

 

[Renfry]

She had what she needed now. She had continued poring over her own grimoire, the writings of other Nightsisters, the holocron of Kravos, and the alchemy holocron as well. After several days of study, she felt she was ready to take the next step, and that meant it was going to be a bad day for a lot of people.

Prisoners, dissidents, and traitors had been brought to Dathomir. Their execution would be anything but conventional. They would crave a firing squad by the end of it, but she needed people to experiment on and these were the best options.

Most of her study resources had been left in the Vault, but she had brought several notes with her to the pit. The pit was precisely what it sounded like. Only a single ladder led out of the pit and that could be withdrawn. It was meant for executing prisoners by beast and was therefore wide and spacious, wrapping around the corner and out of sight, which suited her purposes well.

She had brought her lightsaber in case things went poorly or she lost control of her victims. She brought no one else with her apart from two of her guards. There was an argument that what she was here to do was borderline heretical, but the Nightsisters had a history of altering the body and mind. This was just the next step, and she would see to it that the others came around. It wasn't the first questionable change she had made, and likely wouldn't be the last. If she was careful in how it was implemented, she was confident that it wouldn't be an issue. Like the other changes she had made, it was for the protection of Dathomir. It was all in proportion.

Bring the first one, she said without looking up from her notes. Sheehan and Taurine grabbed the first prisoner - bound and gagged - and dragged him around the corner as Andruil put the notes away.

She looked down at the man with stone cold eyes. There was no pity or remorse, she was just evaluating livestock.

She reached out to the Shadow, closing her eyes and focusing on his body. It began to twist in unnatural ways. Shrieking, cracking, and squishing sounds erupted all at once in a way that was grotesque. It even made Andruil flinch as she watched and looked at it.

And then it stopped. The body continued to twist and warp, but there wasn't any more life in it. It was still and death hung in the air. A failure on that one. On to the next.

 

[Renfry]

It had not been a quick process, but she was sure that were it not for the holocron it would have taken much, much longer. Now, however, she had begun to understand that it wasn't entirely different from the body alterations that the Nightsisters sometimes made to their men. It made them stronger but also more brutish.

This process was just that process but at a significantly higher rate of strain on both body and mind. The first of her creations wasn't pretty, but the warped flesh that now stood in front of her obeyed her orders.

She reached out to the Shadow and channeled it through herself and through the runes she had carved into the ground. It flowed like green mist, surrounding the next prisoner and twisting his body. The process was straining, but less so now that she knew what she was doing.

There was a terrible sound of screaming, breaking bone, and ripping flesh as the body changed in front of her. It was the power to create and destroy. It was... amazing. Empowering. But also sickening. Not a process she would have wished on most, but a good use for the prisoners and traitors to the Sith.

She could feel her body exhausted as she let the creature drop to the ground. Once a human, now a warped and twisted creature with talons and teeth ready to tear the throat out of anyone.

Kill him, she said, pointing to one of the prisoners. The words were less important than the power she placed behind them in the Shadow. Her will was enforced on the creature, subjugating it. Forcing it to see her as the Alpha that it would follow.

And then it eviscerated the prisoner in a bloody and violent shower that made her mouth twist up slightly in a grimace. It would do.