Convoluted Combo: Icy Extinction
By Lord Drakul Xarxes ( @Drakul_Xarxes ), Lord Hypnos ( @Catalyst ), and Lady Joker ( @Hadzuska_The Jester )
By Lord Drakul Xarxes ( @Drakul_Xarxes ), Lord Hypnos ( @Catalyst ), and Lady Joker ( @Hadzuska_The Jester )
Location: Arkania, Veeshas Tuwan
Theme: Ladies of the Wood - The Witcher III
The Execution of Acolyte Dra’Gan
The bitter and unforgiving snows of Arkania, surrounding the iced-over ruins of Veeshas Tuwan’s surface, surrendered to only one: Darth Drakul Xarxes. The steel-clad behemoth trudged through the snows towards the stones of times now past. In his left hand, he clenched the neck of an Arkanian, one much younger than he, whose body was still thrashing whence he was brought, unbound, from the Lounge in Horuset. This was Acolyte Dra’Gan, a recently-admitted member of House Dreadwar and a fellow individual hailing from the Arkanian race. Instantly deifying Lord Xarxes for his race–and seemingly no other reason–the Acolyte had gone about flaunting his empty knowledge, attempting to curry favor from the Council by showcasing what he knew, while simultaneously acting as a stumbling block to others in their endeavors to grow in skill, and not in the Sithly way.
Nay, this individual had caused nothing but trouble, and when time and time again his supposed knowledge was laid bare for all to see its emptiness, he had been unable to humble himself before his superiors.
Xarxes was not himself a merciful individual to those who were deceptive, arrogant, or rude. That alone was enough to warrant this punishment. But for the young Arkanian to have the gall to argue with not only himself, but Lady Joker; to flagrantly offend Lord Hypnos for no apparent reason; to refer so casually to Lord Xxys without using decorum…no, this was a punishment even the most merciful Sith would exact, though perhaps not to such lengths as the Ar’Adas intended to go.
Arriving on the iced-over stones, he thrust the kicking whelp into the ground, cracks forming on the ice around him. The cerulean-tipped scepter of the Nightfather appeared in his empty hand, and the elemental forces of Arkania came to his aid as he froze the one remaining arm of Dra-Gan to the floor, ensuring he would not move from where he stood.
Turning away from the whinging Acolyte, Xarxes looked to the skies, sensing the oncoming presence of his accomplices in the righteous endeavor.
The Fury Class Starship of The Lady of Chaos, Lady Joker, landed close enough to the iced over stones but in a more stable area for a ship. As the ramp descended, it was clear she had forgone her normal vibrant colors, for the colors of Dread, in honor of her former House as it was a higher member's planet that she was gracing with her presence. All in black, with hooded robe to match, her snow white skin gave off a feel of death, only more so as the scythe accompanied her ensemble in hand.
The Acolyte had insulted her intelligence, and flat out stated that he was right and she was wrong. That did not sit well with her. He needed to suffer. And twisted as she may be, her accomplices had their own unique views as well. This was going to be interesting if nothing else.
Approaching Lord Xarxes, not a sound could be heard as if she glided over to them like that of the Visage of Death. As she took her place two crows landed, one on her shoulder, and one atop the scythe, not moving as if they knew waiting would give them a meal.
The sky darkened, a new shape blotting out the sun overhead. A large, spherical structure had materialized and now hung threateningly over the space where Lord Xarxes had dragged the mouthy Acolyte. From beneath the floating sphere, a small iris opened, and from the depths, Lord Hypnos emerged in his humanoid guise.
The Machine God descended with the slow grace of a snowflake from the sky, alighting himself beside the other Dark Lords with nary a sound. He leveled a glare at the Arkanian frozen to the ground at their feet. The Acolyte had personally slighted him with his ignorance, before lashing out with belligerence that would spell his demise. He looked to Lady Joker and Lord Xarxes, nodding in acknowledgement and displaying his readiness to begin.
Xarxes gestured to the specialized environmental HoloNet cams hovering around them, capturing the display for the whole of the galaxy to view. Outstretching his hand, he manipulated the acolyte’s limbs, outstretching them to their maximum without dislocating anything. A ray of cryogenetic power shackled each of his limbs to the floor, keeping him outstretched, forcing him to pull against his own limbs’s joints if he wanted his lungs to expand enough to breathe. This was the beginning of a horizontal crucifixion.
“I care not to waste too much effort on him myself,” the Nightfather whispered to his accomplices. “I will finish him, but I will not expend my energy in overly-dramatic stunts as his pride would wish of me. He shall not have that satisfaction from me. Do with him what you will, but do not dismember him, and do not kill him. I will see his suffering drawn out by the two of you.”
Having finished speaking, the Nightfather moved away, content, for now, to watch the workings of his comrades unfold.
"Rest easy, Lord Xarxes. His pride is abated," Hypnos sang with his signature malevolent cadence. "You may take his life once my bloodlust is sated." He raised a hand, crimson energy crackling across his fingertips. The magics of Mechu Deru quickly spread through the appendage, elongating his fingers into whiplike tentacles that bristled with electricity.
Slowly, the tendrils crawled across the ground to where the Acolyte lay restrained, discharging shocks onto the ground. As they approached, they reared up like vile, robotic cobras, spitting sparks that left minor burns on the pale Arkanian's flesh. Into his mouth and nostrils they crawled, muffling his screams as they traveled down his throat. From here, they began dividing and expanding, like a perverse mockery of the meatbag's circulatory system. They wound their way through his digestive tract, piercing organs with microscopic precision, and threading through his bowels. Pulsing electricity combined with dark side energy wracked his body with spasms. Stomach acid filtered through tears in his abdomen, corroding his other organs and searing his nerves from within.
The tentacles withdrew in a violent, whiplike motion from Dra-Gan's face, leaving him gasping for breath. Hypnos stepped forward, leaning close to the spluttering acolyte. "Let this be your lesson, ignorant one. Nothing gets in the way of a Dark Lord's fun." He turned away, flicking blood and other organic matter from his freshly reformed hand. Once more, he took his place beside the armored form of Lord Xarxes, and patiently awaited Lady Joker's contribution to the artwork they were creating.
The Dark Lady closed her eyes and breathed in deeply, feeding off the dark aura the two Dark Lords accompanying her let off. She fed on their emotions, and she fed on the fear of the acolyte. As she exhaled she opened her eyes and looked upon the insufferable know it all. Lines were traced all around him as if he was a marionette. Would he dance for her? “Dance puppet, dance.” The voices of her past started singing within her mind.
As she raised her hand emerald bolts crackled from her fingertips as they raced for Dra’gan. She focused on the brain itself, not enough to kill him, but enough that he felt the pain. “Know your place, before you spout nonsense as fact to those above you.”
She raised her other hand, releasing more bolts of emerald lightning, she had just hit a nerve that would heighten the pain of suffering. “Sing for us. Sing us a song of your misery. Sing us a song of your torment. Sing us your final song.” The voices of her past piped again within her mind.
His screams were beautiful, majestic, and all together in pain. “You’re better off screaming than arguing.” It was then she let the lightning dissipate, and she turned to Lord Xarxes with a nod. She had her personal entertainment, now it was time for the piece de resistance.
The Ari of Adascopolis stepped forward, thrusting the spike end of his staff into the stone beneath his feet. Where he walked, ice and rock alike cracked beneath him, the silent anger within him manifesting in each slow, intentional step he took towards the splayed, twitching acolyte. He stooped, gripping Dra’Gan by the throat, forcing him to be still.
“Do you know what the punishment for those committing the sin of pride is,” he growled, his mountainous tone barely above a whisper.
The acolyte did not reply.
Xarxes reached up, removing the magnetic mask plate from his helm, allowing the wide eyes of the acolyte to gaze upon his immaculate visage. “It is to not allow them to experience the full power their punishers are capable of dealing. To show you that you are not worthy of the Force being used to end you. That is true humiliation, worm, and today…I will break you.”
Shoving the acolyte’s throat as he released him, his head filling with blood as circulation resumed, Xarxes replaced his mask, sealing himself once more behind the impregnable armor. Without a moment more, he reached down as he straddled the ensnared acolyte, hands, thrust down, digging deep into the flesh of his torso. Had Dra’Gan’s limbs not been locked so, his body would have forced his muscles to contract them towards his center of mass. However, the body’s involuntary reactions only served to help Xarxes with what he did next. Without enough oxygen to scream in pain, all Dra’Gan could do was release a weak moan as Xarxes heaved upwards. His spiked gauntlets deep in the acolyte chest, gripping his structurally important bones, he wrenched the torso from the limbs, quartering him in a matter of seconds. Holding the wracked body for but a moment above his head, Xarxes shifted his grip to the spine and pelvis and, in one fluid motion, pulled apart. Dra’Gan was deboned as easily as a fish, though far less cleanly. Guts spilled between the rent torso and the core bones Xarxes clenched.
He breathed. He had not realized he had been holding it as he exacted his price from Dra’Gan. Taking in his bearings, he clenched his fists, crushing what he held into powder and turning to his accomplices.
“It is finished, and I am sated.”
He looked to the floating HoloNet cams, aimed directly at him. “This is a warning to all who would seek to think themselves above their station, and possessing of knowledge which they wish to flaunt. You, like this one, are not worthy of our use of the Force if these sins are committed. We will exact a penance, and you can look to this as evidence to the fact.”
Without another word he turned, shifted slightly, and was gone, his staff vanishing with him.
Lord Hypnos watched intently as Xarxes spoke his piece. The words echoed truth, and Hypnos found himself in agreement. When Xarxes vanished, he stepped towards the corpse of the Acolyte. Filling his hand with nanogene spores, he flung the virus upon the brutalized body. Microscopic droids entered the gaping wound and immediately rushed to Dra'Gan's brain.
Tearing through nerve clusters and lobotomizing grey matter, they dissected the Acolyte's brain and brought it forth from the opened chest cavity into Hypnos' waiting palm. "May you rest in agony, the price of pride. In the deepest of pits, your mind shall reside." He took the mangled mind and levitated back into the sky towards his ship. Once he had disappeared into its core, the sphere winked from existence, leaving the skies empty once more.
As Lord Hypnos levitated up to his ship, the Lady of Chaos stepped up to the dead acolyte. “Good riddance.” Was all she said before bringing her boot down upon the empty skull, effectively crushing it. She then seemed to blink out of existence, followed shortly by her own ship disappearing into the sky as the crows ripped at the acolyte’s discarded entrails.