Execution Liars and Cheats and Two-Timing Snakes: Karrion Andor

[Klavius Reiix Fenris]

Liars and Cheats and Two-Timing Snakes
Karrion Andor: The First Execution Of The Conquests Era

(Live Footage brought to you by Feralgard Wolftec surveillance)
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It has been a long time since the wolf has been on an honest-to-goodness hunt and when word reached him that Karrion Andor, an Apprentice in his own House of the Feral, had betrayed the Final Sith Order, Klavius Reiix Fenris was immediately on the prowl. He had just fed Karrion in Feralgard's mess hall. Granted, he had drugged him by lacing the food with toxic herbs and rendered him unconscious, but still…

"I took you into my home and we broke bread together," the wolf growled as he stuffed the apprentice in an old vegetable sack, "I was willing to teach you as a fellow warrior and you soil what it means to be a Feral with your arrogance? Not on my watch."

He turned to his trusted Fenrisians, Fáelán and Lycur'gus, two Shistavanen who were a part of Lord Fenris's inner circle. "Take him to the swamps of Ashas Ree. Drop him there and leave him to awaken. Release a few hoverdroids to monitor the upcoming event and broadcast it live to the Final Sith Order, then report back here. We're about to have a little fun…" He turned on his comlink. "Aren't we, Darth Azra?"

Kaela skipped through the forest, gleefully awaiting the carnage, hands in her pockets with her thumbs hooked into her belt loops. "It has been far too long since I have reveled in bloody screams." She paused her skipping to allow the shivers of pleasure crawl slowly from her toes to her nose. She breathed a deep breath, closing her eyes to savor every second of the bone-deep ecstasy.

Later, as Karrion awakened, abandoned in the wilds of Ashas Ree, night had fallen over the swamps. As the apprentice stood and turned a circle, staring into the darkness of the forests surrounding him, pairs of eyes lit up, some closer than others, like candles being ignited two by two all around him. Eyes of apex predators, hungry for an easy kill. And Karrion Andor would unwittingly oblige.

A familiar face waltzed out into the clearing without a care in the world. Her black hair swept gently by the wind, her smile belonging to that of a teenage girl on her first date with her first love. But her eyes, blood red and yellow bored into the skull of Andor as her beautiful crimson lips spoke a single word.

"KILL."

An eerie whistle echoed over the crickets and frogs chirping in the swamp, followed by a taunting voice, singing, "Better run, better run...when the wolves come out to play..."

Karrion saw them; those crimson eyes glittering in the dark. The death wolf of the House of the Feral. Úlfr Stríðsherra and keeper of the Empress's hand--the Empress Karrion had foolishly slandered. And it wasn't even the Empress who had called him out on his laziness. It would have been funny if it weren't so pathetic.

"RUN!" the white wolf's voice hissed in his mind, and Karrion ran. The instant he leaned forward to flee at top speed, multiple packs of Fenwolves led by bloodthirsty Fenrisians pursued him. They howled joyously into the night, thrilled by his sheer terror. The swamp sucked at his boots and low-hanging branches and moss slapped him in the face as he charged aimlessly through the underbrush. The hissed command to "RUN!" kept repeating in his mind like a holorecording. The most feral of the Ferals was going to kill him!

Suddenly, Karrion was joined by his sister. She was angry with him and she threw a hard punch to his side as she ran beside him. "You are an idiot and a disgrace to our mother!" The punch hurt more than a punch normally would and Karrion could feel the warmth of blood soaking his clothing. Touching his side, he realized there was the hilt of a dagger protruding from it. His own sister had stabbed him! He couldn't speak or retaliate, however. The wolves howled again and he had to thrust every bit of his energy into fleeing, which became an even greater urgency as Fenwolves caught up with his sister and pulled her down. Looking back over his shoulder, Karrion saw her vanish beneath the ravenous bodies of the wolves, intent on consuming their kill. She screamed, but it was soon strangled, doubtlessly by merciless jaws finding her throat.

Up ahead Karrion saw the faces of the last of his siblings in a row, each of them crouched in a wrestling stance to catch him. With dread, the failed Apprentice realized that they did not see what had just happened to their sister and shouted to them. "Please! It's a trap!!! We must work together!"

But he was answered with a layered cacophony of shouted responses.

"NO MORE LIES BROTHER!"
"I KNEW YOU WERE GOING TO RIG OUR DUEL AND MURDER ME IN COLD BLOOD!"
"HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO US?!"
"NO MORE CRYING WOLF FOR YOU!"

He slammed into the line of bodies as they piled on top of him, grappling his limbs and holding him down as others kicked and punched him. The wolves never stopped as they leaped onto the table of flesh. Karrion could only see vague shadows through the dog pile as wet, chunky splashes rained down on him. He felt claws and teeth tear at his side as he rolled away through the blood and viscera of his family and blindly started running through the pain and half swollen eyelids.

Fear was like a tracking beacon for Klavius. He knew Karrion's every breath and every step as he took it, but the chase was so much fun. As a wolf, chasing prey was thrilling. Soon, he would have the thrill of the takedown along with his assembled pack. Karrion was nothing more than a helpless herbivore, even as he stopped at a dead end sheer rock face and drew his lightsaber as a last ditch effort at survival.

"You make me laugh, Apprentice," Klavius chuckled as he stepped out of the shadows, flanked by Fáelán, Lycur'gus, and a numerous gathering of Fenwolves, "You really think your glow stick will save you from us? The monsters of fairy tales?"

"I thought you were a friend!" Karrion seethed, his eyes full of hatred for his beastly house leader.

"Ah, but I warned you," the white wolf grinned, "Never forget what I am. I cannot be coaxed or tamed, for I am Wolf and instinct will always override my fondness toward you under the right circumstances. And you provided those circumstances with your very own words and actions. Now...RUN!"

A gesture from the wolf's paw crumbled the rock wall behind Karrion, opening a path for him to flee again. In split-second hesitation, Karrion wondered what the Feral House leader was doing--was he letting him go? Was this just another lesson he was expected to navigate? He didn't take chances waiting any longer and he dashed over the crumbled rocks and boulders, hoping to escape the ire of the death wolf, even as he continued to bleed profusely from his side.

"Why are you letting him go, m'lord?" Lycur'gus asked, confused by his leader's actions.

"I could use a little more cardio," Klavius winked, then took off with a savage snarl that echoed through the marshes. It was time to employ the strategy of the wolf, for which unspoken communication is to be envied. Wolves know their role in the hunt without being told. Fáelán and Lycur'gus followed Karrion's position, accompanied by the Fenwolves. Strategically, they advanced and retreated, nipping at Karrion's heels and leaping for his throat to drive him onward while the Úlfr Stríðsherra went his own way, preparing for the coup de grace that would be delivered by his own teeth and claws. The Empress was growing impatient with his hunt and he could feel her impatience clawing at his belly. She wanted Karrion devoured; swallowed up by his savagery.

By the time Karrion was fleeing into a surprisingly dry riverbed, he was missing a boot, his arms and legs were gashed by fangs, and his face was covered in cuts and bruises. In the riverbed, Klavius's alter ego, the berserker Reiix, lay in wait. As Karrion stopped to catch his breath, Reiix made his presence known, stepping out from behind a large boulder, his massive greatsword Ragnarök drawn and at the ready. Karrion gasped and fumbled for his lightsaber.

"What do you hope to gain, Apprentice," the mighty wolf sighed regretfully, "Surely, despite your foolish choices up until now, you're smart enough to know this is the end of the line."

"I didn't do anything wrong!" Karrion shouted angrily, though desperation was abundantly clear, "The Empress accused me of cheating!"

"The Empress accused you of nothing!" Reiix snarled, "You are so foolish, you don't even know who the Empress is! And that foolishness gives us cause to regret ever allowing you to call yourself a Feral, for you have not lived any of our values."

"End this insolent whelp, Wolf!" the voice of the Empress hissed in his mind as her fist clenched inside his belly, "End him as you did the acolyte in your younger days as a Sith! Devour him like the animal that you are!"

The berserker's lavender eyes shifted to a frightful shade of red, glowing with bloodlust and hunger. He moved toward Karrion, who took a haphazard swing with his lightsaber. The wolf batted it away as nothing with his greatsword, then butted Karrion's face with his shoulder. The apprentice felt like he had been hit with a battering ram as he flew backwards, blood and a few teeth flying from his mouth. He landed hard on the rocky ground. Reiix advanced before Karrion could gather himself and he was upon him in a flash. His fangs found the soft flesh of the apprentice's shrieking throat and his voice was reduced to sickening bloody gurgling as his windpipe was crushed and his arteries torn open. Warm blood sprayed into the berserker's mouth and the feral feel of killing like a beast triggered the Fenris Wolf to come forward, shedding the outgrown armor of his previous berserker form. The ravenous wolf tore into Karrion's dying corpse, opening his abdominal cavity to devour his most vital organs first--the choicest meat in a wolf's diet. Karrion's liver, spleen, and kidneys were the first to disappear, bursting like ripe tomatoes between the giant wolf's incisors. The sound of bones splintering under the crushing force of the wolf's jaws followed as his heart and lungs were the next to go. After that, Fenris consumed the apprentice's remains indiscriminately, the dry riverbed taking in any blood spilled by the four-legged executioner.

By this time, the Fenrisians and Fenwolves had caught up to their leader and his prey, all of them with the blood of Karrion's siblings still staining their muzzles. The Fenris Wolf growled and snapped a warning. He was hungry and this was his meal. The others needed to stay back and they all kept a safe distance as Lord Fenris devoured his kill. By the time he was finished, all that remained of the failed Feral apprentice was his hands. Lord Fenris would not swallow another hand as long as he lived, especially human hands. He relinquished his feral form to become the death wolf Klavius once again.

"Well...that was handy," he chuckled, unaware of the blood staining his own muzzle as he used one of Karrion's splintered ribs to pick his teeth. "Shame I missed the kill though. I hope you guys had fun."

He picked up Karrion's hands and stuffed them in his satchel. Fine trophies for the walls of Feralgard to remind his housemates what happens to those who disrespect the House, the Empire, and the Empress. One by one, the Fenwolves and Fenrisians began to howl, their eerie chorus letting all of Ashas Ree know that justice had been served. The Force Bellow of the biggest and baddest wolf was the crescendo to the haunting Feral symphony.​