Out of the Fire, Into the Furnace

[Balthazar von Kalthus]

(OOC: http://www.swforums.net/forum/showthread.php?s=&postid=713383 Continued from here but with details “changed” for the reset. Instead of the Federacy it was some crazy techno-union experimenting with new neural technology on varying subjects—Balthazar, being in perfect mental and physical condition, was considered a prize. Still, the ex-soldier’s mental conditioning preventing most of the brainwashing techniques being attempted.

Anyway, he’s fairly hazy minded)

Stowed away in the cramped cargo compartment, Balthazar had very little physical accommodations. Instead, the techno-junky allowed his mind to expand into the limitless abyss beyond reality. He closed his pale, sensitive eyes and allowed internal rhythms to take over.

The flow of blood being steadily pumped from the ex-soldier’s heart created a sense of motion similar to that of a rocking boat. Like a vessel gently swaying in the ocean’s splendor, the sensation triggered an insatiable desire to sleep.

Balthazar was dusted with sands that pulled his heavy eyes shut like an airtight compartment’s reinforced bulkhead. He was out cold within only a few minutes—a mixture of military training and physical fatigue.

The unshaven, unkempt man woke to total darkness. The hum of engines was replaced by the whine of a repulsor lift working double time against a planet’s gravity. Where the frell am I? He blinked his azure eyes intently and contorted the muscles of his face as if to see if they still functioned.

Anger rolled over the former special operations officer as he remembered the installation. He had been detained by some weird techn-freaks, kept in a crio-freezer, and… his memories were a blur of actions and emotions. Dates, times, and actual events seemed to float away, just out of his reach. It was as if the truth was a mist that fled his grip.

The vessel jostled as it touched terrafirma, or whatever crazy substance the landing pad was constructed of. Nevertheless, he was safely away from those psychos that had kept him under sedation for… he wondered how long he had really been in the facility.

Balthazar unpacked himself from the cramped compartment and hefted the fairly lightweight rifle. He checked its charge once again and brought the stocky assault weapon to his shoulder.

The pilot was the first to accept a bolt of concentrated whatever-the-hell the gun spat square in his chest. A gaping hole formed on contact and the discharge continued through the forward transparasteel of the shuttle—Crap, that’s excess damage, Kalthus, watch it! Sergeant Vikor would have your head! Well, if the locals didn’t know about the crazy lunatic with a high-powered rifle onboard this shuttle, they do now. Good work.

Balthazar judged his options as the only other occupant of the shuttle shrieked. Great, a frelling woman. She burst from the co-pilots chair and stopped dead in her tracks at the sight of the unkempt man with the rifle.

“Listen—“ the commando started in a kind voice.

A shrill screech boiled Balthazar’s rage over. He swiftly brought the butt of the nova rifle into the woman’s jaw and sent her to the ground. Time for a dramatic exit… or entrance... I guess it'd be both?

The black haired man punched the emergency release button and the landing hatch fell like a ton of rocks. Balthazar sprinted out of the yawning craft, barely clothed, rifle in hand, blasters secured to underarm holsters.

[Balthazar von Kalthus]

The bright sunlight was a serious jolt to the commando’s head. He felt as if someone had tried to play the xylophone with his cranium and a heavy hammer. The crisp image of white adapted quickly to a more feasible retinal interpretation as irises garbed in blue contracted to a pinhole’s diameter.

Seriously. Stop one second, Balthazar. What, the, FRELL ARE YOU DOING! Only a handful of hours ago the man had been in a cryogenic vat with tubes down his throat and in his veins—this thought pulsed through his mind at hyperspeed.

I must be crazy. He wondered for a second if he was really doing this. Not only did he not know the name of the world he was on, Balthazar didn’t even have a clue who had abducted him.

The ex-soldier walked with small steps and rolled off the ball of each foot. The butt of the Nova rifle pressed firmly against Balthazar’s muscular shoulder as he mechanically scanned the landing pad.

Von Kalthus had hoped for a single pad isolated from civilians. What he found instead was a tall green alien with scales screaming in a crazed, insect-like voice at a humanoid. The two gesticulated violently and almost appeared to be in an intricate warrior dance. Balthazar’s eyes shot to the source of the discord—a hole the size of a fist was burnt clean through the jade creature’s freighter.

The commando shook his head sharply as he took in the rest of the details.

A facility rose several stories only a few meters away from the primary landing area—at least, he assumed the over fifty platforms made up the bulk of the spaceport’s accommodations.

Every sense that Balthazar possessed suddenly was pulled into tight focus as white-clad soldiers marched down the long rows of vessels. Oooo, bad boys. Great, more fluff to add to the fire. Once these guys are down, there’ll be a galaxy wide bounty on my head.

“Better not wait for them,” whispered the insane ex-operative to himself as he tightened his hold on the rifle. With a relaxed finger, Balthazar delicately pulled the trigger.

An insane bolt of blue energy clouded in static discharge roared from the assault weapon and slammed into the leading blanch-armored man. The energy incinerated the protective material and ate through flesh. Flakes, chunks of the soldier burnt to a crisp, still crimson from sudden combustion fled the gaping wound in the soldier’s chest.

Expressionlessly, the helmeted, nameless warrior looked at his murderer. The cold black eyes of the devious head-gear cut through Balthazar. A note of sorrow was plucked followed by a pressure on the commando’s chest as he snapped off more shots and began to run for the nearest cover—an aging frigate with little ground clearance.

[Balthazar von Kalthus]

The disassociation hit him with the full weight of a freighter running at maximum burn. His head suddenly felt bloated and his skull far too small. Balthazar’s consciousness curled up into a fetal position and pulled its tendrils from his body’s extremities—every sense went numb and lifeless.

Like some sort of inverse resurrection, the soldier folded into himself and lost existence.

Battering, chaotic surges of pain blurred what little vision the man retained as he fell like an uncoupled cargo container on lift off. The surface of the landing pad felt very, very solid. In fact, Balthazar had never noticed the hardness of the paving material. It seemed very cold and stiff and touched all of his exposed flesh with fingers of shock.

The feeling melted away into a general sense of nothingness. Like appendages dying from frostbite, the sensation of “being there” left.

One last breath before he fell into complete and total unconsciousness.

[Balthazar von Kalthus]

Balthazar woke with the taste of a dream still on his mental tongue, a tantalizing, cloudy memory parching his desire and filling his body with urges. He clawed at the remnants in hopes of holding the fragments safe, yet the tatters melted like snow held near an open flame. The dream dissolved.

Pain replaced the pleasure. Sickness churned waves in the acidic sea of the techno-junkie’s stomach. As if some moon had suddenly taken an eccentric orbit, Balthazar’s insides seemed to rise and fall, creating a nauseating rhythm.

The ex-commando closed his hazy eyes and took a deep breath from his diaphragm. The cool, moist oxygen flooded his lunges and created a tight sensation in his chest. The expansion of muscles felt good and slightly sore—as if the strands of tightly packed protein needed the exercise.

After a few moments, the azure-eyed freelancer took in his surroundings. The room was small and dark. Based off the light ambiance, Balthazar figured the walls were some sort of reinforced metal roughly four by five by three meters.

For the first time Balthazar noticed extra weight on his arms. It were as if they were bolted directly into the metallic floor. A soreness sank in around his wrists and realization flooded his mind—shackles held his arms firmly in place.

Thoughts of torture and imprisonment by Imperial savages filled the now focused warrior’s imagination. A cold shiver ran up the man’s spine and he could feel his groin and stomach tighten in apprehension and anticipation of future terrors.

“Another brilliant show, Balthazar,” the ex-soldier spoke under his calm breaths, “locked away in a dark world. Back to the beginning, I guess.” A sly grin formed on his bark-like lips. “I guess I’ll just have to break out again.”

[Balthazar von Kalthus]

Balthazar hummed a Corellian junk metal rhythm to himself as he waited for the hopelessly dramatic entrance of his interrogator. The idea of being tortured left his stomach unsettled—he hated the pointlessness of it all. There was no way his training would allow him to reveal anything of vital importance; after all, what did he know?

The light panels in the dark room suddenly clapped to life with an electrical hum. After a brief moment Balthazar forced his pupils to adapt and stopped wincing at the stark whiteness of the glowing devices. And time for the theatrical entrance…

A man dressed in a black Imperial uniform entered the room with an aura of snobbery. In fact, his wheat blond hair and crystal blue eyes made the officer appear as if he were an actor used in recruiting holos. Baltahzar shook his head noticeably from side to side and sighed audible.

“Something the matter, Von Kalthus?”

“It’s Balthazar. Just Balthazar.”