freedomliveson

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Her reassurances was all he needed to break into a smile, the Champion quickly firing the engines on the ship and throttling into the atmosphere as he and Aria discussed their supply situation and their plans to occupy their journey, which would mainly shape up into the form of meditation and discussion about how to take down Illesia. They reviewed their previous encounters with her, attempting to identify any kind of weakness she had. Yerbol had run into several dead ends with his own ideas before Ari suggested an elaboration on what he attempted to do to her on Coruscant.
"Severing her connection would work, yeah. I tried to do something like that on Coruscant when we fought her last time. It was a strange feeling, surreal almost, to be able to control someone's connection to the Force. I was able to weaken her slightly, which I guess was enough for us to scare her off...of course, I wasn't one hundred percent. Maybe now we'll have a chance to actually use all those abilities Renso taught us to their fullest potential." A thought jumped to the forefront of his mind.
"Isn't it interesting that Renso taught us techniques that bend the Force? I mean, ok, think about the Jedi. It was all about restriction, total self-control. They wanted the Force to control their actions. So MUCH of what I heard when I was a student was that the Force was supposed to be our guide, not the other way around. Then..." A slight chuckle as he pointed to Aria.
"There was what you had to put up with. Domination. The Force was a weapon that was only a tool to satisfy a desire for total power. Renso had us toeing that line the entire time we were there." He laid himself on the ship's cold floor.
"Bloody sad that Illesia had to be the result of Renso mastering his knowledge of Force. I guess, in a way, our knowledge came from Illesia and the Xiis' creation." He shuddered.
"Gives me the willies." Shaking off the philosophical tangent, he carried on with the topic at hand:
"Right, so we touch down and if we focus our energy, channel it all in her direction, then-" He snapped his fingers.
"AH! Right. So we've two choices..." His left arm shot upward.
"We could try to overload her with both the energy on the planet(like you said) and channel whatever we can from our own link to the Force into hers. Sure she feeds on energy, but even she must have a limit. Right?" Grimacing, his other arm went vertical.
"Or we could sever her connection entirely. That would mean one of us could keep her distracted while the other cuts off every possible link to the Force she has." As his arms flopped back down, he popped up into a seated position, the grimace still there.
"I suppose we'll try to figure out what avenue we take when we touch down, eh? Get a feel for the planet." There were still a couple of hours left to go, which gave the duo one last chance to meditate and draw on the Force to give them as much strength as possible. They would need it.

Chuffon Prime's landscape was far too similar to that of a certain snow planet that Yerbol couldn't stand.
"Not a word. Not. A. Word." He shot his partner a glare as they skirted over the ground at a low enough elevation that would allow them visibility.
"Now to find out where she could be..." There were a few mountain ranges that bore no importance to the terrain scanner, the same results showing up when they surveyed a row of glaciers a few yards off from a large plain of snow.
"That vision we had...the eyes that glowed out of glaciers...that formation we saw didn't look like this one, but something similar." A few more minutes of searching revealed an odd formation of glaciers that featured extremely high peaks flanking a spherical middle that couldn't have been more than twenty feet off the ground.
"Soooomething tells me that we found where we need to be."

After touching down, they emerged onto a sweeping plain that stretched out seemingly into infinity in all other directions except for the strange glacial formation in question. There was a narrow opening in the ice about three feet wide that, when seen at a much closer distance, gave just enough of a view into-
"Pitch black, not see through or opaque even. Gotta be it." With some forceful swings from their blades, they were able to carve out a wider entrance and barreled into the darkness. Their footsteps echoed off the ceilings and walls, the floor beneath stiff and dry. With some illumination from his right hand, they saw the dull grey durasteel that composed the hallway(or tunnel) that they currently occupied. There were no other paths to take other than straight ahead, which naturally sloped downward a few feet before leveling off. A few hundred more feet of walking ushered them into a small rectangular room that was illuminated by dull yellow lanterns mounted on all four sides of the room. Across from them were a set of pods, most of which were scuff-free and managed to gleam even in the lighting. There was one, however, with shattered glass where the viewport would have been.
"So you finally came." A voice floated from the damaged pod, Illesia's crimson eyes flashing with intent.
"I didn't think it would take you THIS long to find me." Blue hands gripped either side of the opening, shards of glass piercing her hands as she casually hoisted herself out.
"Renso's disciples." She clicked her tongue off the roof of her mouth, arms folding over her chest.
"That's what he wanted us to become. Learners. Leeches. Hanging off his every word, feeding on whatever he gave us before plucked off and thrown into the galaxy where we could perpetuate his stupidity." Her leg muscles flexed in agitation.
"I believed him once, long ago. Even through the constant 'tests' and 'trials' he said would make us stronger. It wasn't until he drove home one single point that I realized he was a sham." Illesia took a step forward.
"He told me that I was supposed to be a force for harmony. For balance." A jaded chuckle.
"And then he would make us fight to near death. To 'hone our skills'. He would have us hunt for beasts in darkened tombs only to tell us that our 'savage nature' needed to be tamed even more to succeed. The utter hypocrisy." Her arms extended outward, teeth exposed as she grinned.
"And I look forward to making sure that nothing he stood for will remain."

Witcher: March to War (NecroKnight x freedomliveson)

"No, no, hold off a moment." Roche squinted for a moment, focusing on the clothing of those who accompanied the treasure trove Eve had already identified.
"Commander, we've got a bead on em from the treeline just across from us. Just got to give em the signal." Ves implored, slight agitation betraying her desire to eliminate the perceived threat.
"Something about this is off. The cloaks they're wearing, the stitching..." He shook his head, knowing that the more he delayed, the farther away the caravan became. The Blue Stripes commander nodded.
"Do it. Quietly." In a flicker of a moment arrows ejected from the trees bordering the path that the caravan took, most of the missiles hitting their mark with precision. Out of the six travelers, two remained, both of them flanking the wagon with swords brandished in their hands, a glow emanating from the tip of the blades. As the trio descended from the hilltop, screams of agony assaulted their ears. What they found upon getting to level ground were the bodies of three Commandos crumpled at the base of their former perches, smoke wafting from holes burned through their chests.
"Mages?" Vernon asked to no one, approaching the bodies before examining them with a cautious eye.
"No blood. Clean entrance and exit..." He swiveled his head around to find that the figures with the glowing swords were now missing. Striding to the caravan, he extracted a rolled up piece of parchment that, when unveiled, had a column of..ingredients?
"Wormstooth, Vampire oil...potion ingredients?" He handed the parchment to Eve as he rummaged through the other rolls of paper to find similarly inscribed "recipes".
"You're the Witcher; what are all these recipes for?"

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

A few quick things:

1. Feel free to have me edit that both the hounds would go. I figured that the male hound would attach himself to Yerbol just due to bro camaraderie

2. Post was a bit on the shorter side, so I can get us to Chuffon Prime in next post.

3. I really wanted Yerbol to get all that stuff off his chest before confronting Illesia and thought that it might be best for Ari to hear some/most of it. If you want me to edit out that she appeared, feel free to tell me and I'll revise :)

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

It was difficult to believe that Vano could be THIS adept at pulling information from archives that required constant translating and deciphering, seeing as she had little experience with the language or culture of the True Sith, but it was apparent that her naturally quick wit and sharp intellect was exactly where it belonged. After the brilliant Mirilian gave the duo their marching orders, Yerbol left Aria to deal with gathering any supplies for their journey while he went back to their ship in order to program the coordinates and figure out their best point of entry. During the walk to the ship and subsequent entrance, he was shadowed by Taral, who wouldn't let the Champion out of his sight no matter how times Yerbol told the hound that he would be fine and "wouldn't it be better to hang out with the women?" All of his protests were met with a shake of the head and a snort, the beast padding alongside in defiance. It wasn't until they got to the cockpit that Yerbol addressed the hound since his final protest a few hundred yards back:
"I don't need your help inputting coordinates, bud. I'll be fine, honest!" Another snort.
"Taral..." He collapsed into the pilot's chair, inputting coordinates that Vano had sent to their nav panel with his left hand while his right was nudged by Taral's snout onto his head, indicating that the ferocious monster wanted his head scratched.
"We spoil you far too much. You should be out hunting bad guys and tearing weaklings in half." A half-hearted chuckle came out of his tired throat as he complied with the beast's not so subtle directive, left hand returning to his lap with business finished. Taral snorted again.
"You honestly can feel that?" A brief nod of the head.
"I sorely underestimate how much you can sense." He blew out a sigh, looking into the watery eyes of his once feral companion before staring out the viewing glass.
"I haven't told her anything because I'm bloody scared." Taral's head came forward to rest on Yerbol's right thigh.
"I'm terrified that she'll think less of me. I mean, I'm supposed to be the strong idealist, right? That one that's unflappable, the one that can give HER strength and I...I feel like I've been ripped apart. Whatever Illesia did shook me so hard. Still does."
"Bad?" Taral throatily grunted.
"Yeah, bad. She made me doubt myself. Not that I haven't done that before, but this was different. She threatened my existence, the core of who I am." His left hand scrunched into a fist.
"Her talons just DUG into my mind, manipulating memories, causing me to doubt who I was loyal to, who I could trust, who I couldn't and...for a while, even my feelings for Ari." The fist tightened.
"I didn't want to see her again. Ari, I mean. Illesia dominated not only my mind, but my heart and she almost..." He chuckled briefly.
"Sucked the ability to feel out of my being? Does that make sense?" Taral stayed quiet.
"I guess not, but that's the only way I could describe it. There was only a hunger for her. It was primal. Disgusting. And I have no clue how I'm supposed to tell her about this." He looked down at Taral.
"And no, it's not what you're thinking. No matter what that she-devil did to me, I would never betray Ari like that. Didn't seem like Illesia was too concerned about breaking my body, but breaking the very core of who I am." There was a familiar presence he felt unmask itself behind him, someone who he hadn't intended to have hear these declarations. Taral withdrew, allowing Yerbol to face her with chagrin.
"I ah...Taral's a good listener." He laughed nervously, looking at the ground as he cleared his throat.
"I know you haven't asked about what happened and I was going to tell you, but...well, I didn't want you to think less of me." Drawing a bit closer, he took one of her hands in his.
"That I was somehow inferior or couldn't hold my own against the kind of power I know we're going to come across sometime in the future...well, near future with Illesia coming up." He approached her, slipping his arms around her waist.
"But I can promise you this: that whatever she did to me, whatever scars I have...they're going to only motivate me to keep going. I'm not backing away from this fight or any of them for that matter. We fight together. Right?"

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

I'm so sorry, but post will have to wait until Monday. I promise I'll make it up to you with character revelations in my next post!

Witcher: March to War (NecroKnight x freedomliveson)

Hey Necro, life has been NUTS. Will try to post today, but if not, Monday for sure.

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Sorry for lack of post today, but my wife and I MIGHT have found a home! Will post first thing tomorrow :)

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Also, I put Roans name where Renso should've been...Heh xD

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

Hey, so I kinda assumed Roan would disappear, but if not, just let me know and I'll edit :)

You never see it coming[Freedomliveson/The Elvenqueen]

An immense weight filled the cave, threatening to crush every ounce of strength he was attempting to muster in preparation to dispatch(or so he thought) the supposed harbingers of chaos that Illesia had brought back to life. It was his gaze. The piercing, all knowing black hole that simultaneously destroyed one's self-will and sapped any kind of resistance one could put up to the ravenous hunger that emanated from it. He was all too familiar with this leeching of power, which allowed him the leisure of averting eye contact, about to warn Aria when she suddenly tilted her downward and headed backwards in the direction of the exit. It was odd that she knew how to counteract the initial blow from the Five, but he wouldn't question the intuition, instead affirming her sentiment that they couldn't allow the Five to leave the cave. If they were set loose on the galaxy, the doomsday scenario Bracknell would have enacted those months ago looked optimistic.
"They'll get nowhere." He looked to Aria with a nod, quickly going on the offensive with their array of attacks that normally were effective on the first go around, but the Five displayed their genetic engineering and training from the True Sith, easily side stepping and dodging attacks while managing to get in a few quick swipes right before Yerbol could throw up a blade in return. Within seemingly mere moments, they were separated, Yerbol cornered by three of the Five, their eyes flashing in malevolent lust. Thankfully Taral and Chwuq were nearby to get in a few bites and scratches, Taral going so far as to completely tear one of the Five's shins right out of her skin, allowing Yerbol to finish one of the would-be chaos bringers quite easily. It didn't take long for Chwuq to gallantly stomp across the room to help Aria out, but surprisingly it didn't hinder his battle with the remaining Five; in fact, it felt easier, his blows coming closer and closer to fruition. However, Yerbol misjudged a blow and slashed too fast, allowing one of the men to pirouette away before slamming his shoulder into Yerbol's chest, knocking him backwards while the other came at his neck, talons ready to dig into the Champion's jugular. He managed to throw a current of energy at the oncoming Xiis, but not before the first attacker sliced at his midsection, three jagged slashes marking Yerbol's abdomen. With the second attacker already back on her feet and the other Xiis onlookers blocking the exit, it seemed like their graves would be dug in this cave.

That was until Cheriss came.

He couldn't help but laugh at the almost comical flailing the Xiis underlings participated in as their blue forms made sickening cracks against the marble altar, Cheriss proclaiming that she had received a tip on their whereabouts before joining Yerbol's side to thwart the other two members of the Five. He wanted to check on Aria, but the thunderous threats uttered in an all too familiar voice made Yerbol look over at the rippling mass of dark energy for just a moment, which gave one of the Five the time he needed to leap into the air and deliver a thundering blow to his chest. Cheriss scowled at the Champion's lack of focus before delivering a burst of lightning at the attacker, his body going limp as it dropped to the ground. With no other support, the last member of the Five standing hissed, teeth bared in one final act of defiance as she dashed forward, Yerbol intercepting her and ducking under her reach as he ran her through with one of his blades, withdrawing it to allow the body to crumple to the cave floor.
"Distracted at a time like this?" Cheriss asked as she clucked disapprovingly at his wounds.
"You saw that, right?! All that black energy just floating in to help us? Did you summon something?"
"I don't think I was ever strong enough to control that man. No one was."
"Man? Wha-" As Ari rejoined them, he saw that the energy had form...
"Ro...Roan?" With a nod, the form disappeared, leaving the trio alone with nothing but corpses and the hounds.
"I mean, am I the only..." Aria's statement brought him back once again to their current state of affairs. Swearing under his breath, he examined the chamber in vain before saying:
"She's bound to be off world by now, especially with this being the last..well, really, the only plan she had. With the Five gone, where else could she go?"

Her fingers traced across his chest, her lips at his ear

Home...jealous...so jealous of home...so jealous of home...

He grit his teeth, the memories of he and Illesia's "evening" together flooding back at a time when he desperately wanted to push them out, yet they pulsed through his mind:

Home is...never me...never...I...jealous of your home...

"Home...jealous of home..." He mumbled to himself, ignorant of the blood dribbling down his tattered shirt as he paced, fingers massaging his temples.
"HOME!" He pointed upward.
"Illesia's going back to where Renso first planted them. She's obsessed with it, wants to go back and 'reclaim it' for themselves. She was so insistent on that point. To make a home for her people, like they had before...like we have now." He rubbed the back of his neck in agitation, not able to look Aria in the eye as he mumbled:
"When she went into my mind...I saw some of hers." That's all he could allow himself to say. There was much about that evening that he hadn't told Aria about simply because he couldn't come up with the words. In time he knew they would come, but for now...
"Renso must've known where the home planet was...think we can find some stuff in the archives?"