Baralai Lotus
Jun 17th, 2009, 02:01:01 PM
The overhead lights came to life, forcing their harsh glow on Baralai’s face. His left eye winced from the intense light, and scanned the room, watching as several droids crowded around him.
He was lying on a surgical table, the cool steel running down his back as he lie there, waiting for his newest modification. Baralai was ready to give up his mental voice, ready to make himself a warrior once again, and his encounter with Crestmere and the Inquisitoriate had proven to him that a tongue was a valuable weapon.
When he had spoken to Crestmere, he had entered his thoughts and been assaulted by thousands of voices, all screaming at him at once. It was something that had caused him to lose focus, and ultimately, he was forced to retreat. It made him realize that his mind was vulnerable as long as he used it to speak. He needed to be able to communicate verbally, like men did.
“Are you ready?”
Baralai nodded and the droid raised its arm. A syringe pushed its way from the inside of the droids surgical apparatus.
“Just some anesthetic. It won’t last long. The operation is fairly short.”
The droids had been programmed to seem personable and friendly. They seemed more human than most of the soldiers aboard The Abaddon, but just like the soldiers, they were controlled and manufactured machines, incapable of doing anything more than what they were programmed to do.
As the needle neared Baralai’s arm, his hand rose and his fist tightened. Slowly, the needle began to bend, snapping in half and falling to the table. Baralai shook his head, indicating he did not need the anesthetic. Baralai had lost his tongue while in immense pain, and he would receive it the same way.
The other droids began to place various clamps and devices in his mouth to hold it open. The splayed, scarred and destroyed lips were peeled back, revealing broken, yellow teeth, and in the center of his mouth, flapping desperately back and forth between his gums was his tongue.
The thin piece of muscle was torn and frayed, evidence of the horrors he had undergone when he was a prisoner of the Inquisitoriate. For years, Baralai had always seen his mental voice as a sign of his Godhood, as a symbol that fueled his revenge. Every time he had been unable to speak, he was reminded of Tear’s grinning face, his eyes staring into Baralai’s.
It was the only time where Baralai had felt truly afraid. Afraid that he might die and never see the light of day, and that fear drove him further. It drove him to become stronger, to become smarter. In the hopes that one day, he would destroy Tear and the Inquisitoriate, and reclaim his voice.
And here he lay, in one of their operating rooms, on one of their ships, having it so generously returned to him now that he was their lapdog.
The droid grabbed at a small box to its right, sliding out the tiny compartment and pulling a small type of machine. Coated in a silver metal, the device was shaped like a slug, and it seemed limp in the droids hands. It was his tongue. Baralai looked too his right arm, and he could feel the gears twist and turn inside, hear the sparks of the circuits as they fed signals to his body.
It was trying to tell him that this was his arm, but he knew better. It was a machine, and now he was about to become even less human. Baralai had once valued being a human that ascended to Godhood, and now he was becoming more of a machine. An assassin and less of an Alchemist. He was becoming a soldier, like all of the others onboard the Abaddon. Controlled like the machines, created by the soldiers, and his only master was a man he had once sworn to destroy.
As his mind raced, he felt the sudden jerk of pain in the back of his mind. His back arched, and a choking sound escaped from his throat. The droids had begun reattaching the nerves and the muscles to the circuits of the mechanical slug they were putting inside of his mouth.
He felt adrenaline course through his system and tried to control his breathing, taking in short gasps through his nose and pushing them back out quickly, attempting to keep himself from blacking out from any pain. It felt like fire was coursing down through his body, each nerve that was soldered onto the circuits was like a nail being driven into the back of his throat.
His eyes widened from the pain, and he looked up into the lights of the operating table, feeling the intense heat they gave off. Slowly, the lights began to fade, and were overcast by darkness. He felt a cool breath enter into his lungs as he watched the darkness begin to take shape into that of a large vulture.
A black vulture swooped overhead, flapping its wings as it circled Baralai. It had come to claim him; it had come to take him away into death. Baralai watched as the creature gazed at him, shooting its eyes down onto him. He could feel the beat of its wings on his face, watching as it cycled around him. And then Baralai saw the color of the vulture’s eyes, and felt as he did all those years ago.
The same eyes of his master, staring directly at him, and as the creature screeched, Baralai screamed. The vulture came in fast, flying at his face with its talons open and sharp, prepared for the kill. The bird swooped down and as it came toward him, Baralai felt fear again. He was afraid of this monster, this beast that was coming to claim him.
The serpent was to be claimed by the vulture. Ouroboros was no match for Quetzalcoatl, and as such, he would be torn into the sky. Baralai felt the birds talons dig into his chest, and his back arched. The bird was digging, not for his heart, but for something deeper. And in an instant, it took off, carrying a green serpent between its talents.
The serpent didn’t have the strength to fight, and it could only write as the talons dug deeper into its flesh. Slowly, the figures faded out, and Baralai blacked out.
When he awoke, he was lying on the operating table. The droids were putting away tools, and Baralai felt no pain. He looked to the droid, and it turned around, noticing that he was awake.
“You began to hallucinate. So we administered the anesthetic. It was all we could do to finish the operation. But in the end, it was a success.”
Baralai stared. A success. He had a tongue again. He could speak if he wanted. But the vulture, the vulture had carried him away. It had taken Ouroboros from him, and the droid approached him again, holding a small piece of black leather in its palm.
“You knocked this off when you were seizing.”
Baralai grabbed the leather and turned it over in his palm, staring at the silver Ouroboros on his eye patch. His face turned to a mirror, and he saw the empty socket where his eye once was. Scars cracked and webbed from the small cavity that had once held a shimmering emerald orb. The vulture had claimed the serpent, and where there was once emptiness, Baralai saw the shimmering glow of orange, like a sunset in the darkness of the socket.
His master, the vulture, stared at him from inside. Just as the serpent had been a part of him, it was now replaced by the vulture. But unlike the serpent, it could rip through him at any moment, and he would be torn to nothing. He was at the mercy of the vulture.
“Yes, yes. As it were.”
Baralai leapt at the sound of his own voice, unlike anything he remembered it being. It was soft and weak, not like the voice he’d heard in his head. It was not the voice of a God, merely that of a man. A man, who had been beaten and scarred, pushed and tugged and made to be a servant. It was the voice of a fearful man, and it was his.
He stood, and began walking toward the door. His thoughts raced back to various moments in his life. To his knighting, to the moments with the Inquisitoriate, and then to the night in the alleyway, where two young women stood in front of him and he had his first encounter with the jedi.
And then he remembered Victor, his partner that he had created out of various machines and people. He looked to his arm and remembered the slug in his mouth, and realized that he was becoming what he had once created. He was nothing but a toy of his master now.
“T-t-they don’t know how to p-p-play nice,” he said, the stutter overtaking his words. He struggled to push the words out, pushing past the spit and blood in his mouth, expelling it out onto the floor. A droid rolled underneath his feet and began to clean it. Baralai looked down and smiled at the droid now cleaning up his mess.
He chuckled and heard his laugh, excited and interested at the small device beneath him. He smiled again, and threw his leg forward; kicking the small droid and watching it fly against the wall, smashing as it hit the steel walls of the room.
He chuckled again, and began walking toward the door. The droid who had operated turned around, trying to protest, telling Baralai that he needed to wait for his wounds to heal first.
He walked out the door, throwing up his hand and refusing to acknowledge the droid.
“You don’t know how to p-p-play. I have work to do, many t-t-things to do before I can make a new t-t-toy.”
The door slid closed behind him and as Baralai walked down the hallway, he mumbled too himself, about things he had read in the Sith Library. Now that he could speak again, he began to repeat everything he’d read when he had still lived at the Order.
Thoughts about the ancient Sith, locations of the old Empire, the different ways in which he had been trained, and the many encounters he’d had during his walks down the old hallways. Conversations, information, titles, songs, everything escaped his lips at a quickening pace, almost too much for him to keep up with. But, through all the chaos, Baralai was able to derive a pattern, and from that pattern, he formed a plan.
His smile curled upward, and his voice stopped. He turned to the nearest soldier, and he snapped his fingers, calling him over.
“Sir?” The soldier responded.
“P-p-prepare a t-t-transport.”
The soldier stared quizzically, “To where, sir?”
Baralai nodded, “Yes, yes. As it were.” And then he strolled off, mumbling too himself again. The soldier spoke over his communicator, telling the others to prep a transport for Baralai, and be ready to take off momentarily.
He was lying on a surgical table, the cool steel running down his back as he lie there, waiting for his newest modification. Baralai was ready to give up his mental voice, ready to make himself a warrior once again, and his encounter with Crestmere and the Inquisitoriate had proven to him that a tongue was a valuable weapon.
When he had spoken to Crestmere, he had entered his thoughts and been assaulted by thousands of voices, all screaming at him at once. It was something that had caused him to lose focus, and ultimately, he was forced to retreat. It made him realize that his mind was vulnerable as long as he used it to speak. He needed to be able to communicate verbally, like men did.
“Are you ready?”
Baralai nodded and the droid raised its arm. A syringe pushed its way from the inside of the droids surgical apparatus.
“Just some anesthetic. It won’t last long. The operation is fairly short.”
The droids had been programmed to seem personable and friendly. They seemed more human than most of the soldiers aboard The Abaddon, but just like the soldiers, they were controlled and manufactured machines, incapable of doing anything more than what they were programmed to do.
As the needle neared Baralai’s arm, his hand rose and his fist tightened. Slowly, the needle began to bend, snapping in half and falling to the table. Baralai shook his head, indicating he did not need the anesthetic. Baralai had lost his tongue while in immense pain, and he would receive it the same way.
The other droids began to place various clamps and devices in his mouth to hold it open. The splayed, scarred and destroyed lips were peeled back, revealing broken, yellow teeth, and in the center of his mouth, flapping desperately back and forth between his gums was his tongue.
The thin piece of muscle was torn and frayed, evidence of the horrors he had undergone when he was a prisoner of the Inquisitoriate. For years, Baralai had always seen his mental voice as a sign of his Godhood, as a symbol that fueled his revenge. Every time he had been unable to speak, he was reminded of Tear’s grinning face, his eyes staring into Baralai’s.
It was the only time where Baralai had felt truly afraid. Afraid that he might die and never see the light of day, and that fear drove him further. It drove him to become stronger, to become smarter. In the hopes that one day, he would destroy Tear and the Inquisitoriate, and reclaim his voice.
And here he lay, in one of their operating rooms, on one of their ships, having it so generously returned to him now that he was their lapdog.
The droid grabbed at a small box to its right, sliding out the tiny compartment and pulling a small type of machine. Coated in a silver metal, the device was shaped like a slug, and it seemed limp in the droids hands. It was his tongue. Baralai looked too his right arm, and he could feel the gears twist and turn inside, hear the sparks of the circuits as they fed signals to his body.
It was trying to tell him that this was his arm, but he knew better. It was a machine, and now he was about to become even less human. Baralai had once valued being a human that ascended to Godhood, and now he was becoming more of a machine. An assassin and less of an Alchemist. He was becoming a soldier, like all of the others onboard the Abaddon. Controlled like the machines, created by the soldiers, and his only master was a man he had once sworn to destroy.
As his mind raced, he felt the sudden jerk of pain in the back of his mind. His back arched, and a choking sound escaped from his throat. The droids had begun reattaching the nerves and the muscles to the circuits of the mechanical slug they were putting inside of his mouth.
He felt adrenaline course through his system and tried to control his breathing, taking in short gasps through his nose and pushing them back out quickly, attempting to keep himself from blacking out from any pain. It felt like fire was coursing down through his body, each nerve that was soldered onto the circuits was like a nail being driven into the back of his throat.
His eyes widened from the pain, and he looked up into the lights of the operating table, feeling the intense heat they gave off. Slowly, the lights began to fade, and were overcast by darkness. He felt a cool breath enter into his lungs as he watched the darkness begin to take shape into that of a large vulture.
A black vulture swooped overhead, flapping its wings as it circled Baralai. It had come to claim him; it had come to take him away into death. Baralai watched as the creature gazed at him, shooting its eyes down onto him. He could feel the beat of its wings on his face, watching as it cycled around him. And then Baralai saw the color of the vulture’s eyes, and felt as he did all those years ago.
The same eyes of his master, staring directly at him, and as the creature screeched, Baralai screamed. The vulture came in fast, flying at his face with its talons open and sharp, prepared for the kill. The bird swooped down and as it came toward him, Baralai felt fear again. He was afraid of this monster, this beast that was coming to claim him.
The serpent was to be claimed by the vulture. Ouroboros was no match for Quetzalcoatl, and as such, he would be torn into the sky. Baralai felt the birds talons dig into his chest, and his back arched. The bird was digging, not for his heart, but for something deeper. And in an instant, it took off, carrying a green serpent between its talents.
The serpent didn’t have the strength to fight, and it could only write as the talons dug deeper into its flesh. Slowly, the figures faded out, and Baralai blacked out.
When he awoke, he was lying on the operating table. The droids were putting away tools, and Baralai felt no pain. He looked to the droid, and it turned around, noticing that he was awake.
“You began to hallucinate. So we administered the anesthetic. It was all we could do to finish the operation. But in the end, it was a success.”
Baralai stared. A success. He had a tongue again. He could speak if he wanted. But the vulture, the vulture had carried him away. It had taken Ouroboros from him, and the droid approached him again, holding a small piece of black leather in its palm.
“You knocked this off when you were seizing.”
Baralai grabbed the leather and turned it over in his palm, staring at the silver Ouroboros on his eye patch. His face turned to a mirror, and he saw the empty socket where his eye once was. Scars cracked and webbed from the small cavity that had once held a shimmering emerald orb. The vulture had claimed the serpent, and where there was once emptiness, Baralai saw the shimmering glow of orange, like a sunset in the darkness of the socket.
His master, the vulture, stared at him from inside. Just as the serpent had been a part of him, it was now replaced by the vulture. But unlike the serpent, it could rip through him at any moment, and he would be torn to nothing. He was at the mercy of the vulture.
“Yes, yes. As it were.”
Baralai leapt at the sound of his own voice, unlike anything he remembered it being. It was soft and weak, not like the voice he’d heard in his head. It was not the voice of a God, merely that of a man. A man, who had been beaten and scarred, pushed and tugged and made to be a servant. It was the voice of a fearful man, and it was his.
He stood, and began walking toward the door. His thoughts raced back to various moments in his life. To his knighting, to the moments with the Inquisitoriate, and then to the night in the alleyway, where two young women stood in front of him and he had his first encounter with the jedi.
And then he remembered Victor, his partner that he had created out of various machines and people. He looked to his arm and remembered the slug in his mouth, and realized that he was becoming what he had once created. He was nothing but a toy of his master now.
“T-t-they don’t know how to p-p-play nice,” he said, the stutter overtaking his words. He struggled to push the words out, pushing past the spit and blood in his mouth, expelling it out onto the floor. A droid rolled underneath his feet and began to clean it. Baralai looked down and smiled at the droid now cleaning up his mess.
He chuckled and heard his laugh, excited and interested at the small device beneath him. He smiled again, and threw his leg forward; kicking the small droid and watching it fly against the wall, smashing as it hit the steel walls of the room.
He chuckled again, and began walking toward the door. The droid who had operated turned around, trying to protest, telling Baralai that he needed to wait for his wounds to heal first.
He walked out the door, throwing up his hand and refusing to acknowledge the droid.
“You don’t know how to p-p-play. I have work to do, many t-t-things to do before I can make a new t-t-toy.”
The door slid closed behind him and as Baralai walked down the hallway, he mumbled too himself, about things he had read in the Sith Library. Now that he could speak again, he began to repeat everything he’d read when he had still lived at the Order.
Thoughts about the ancient Sith, locations of the old Empire, the different ways in which he had been trained, and the many encounters he’d had during his walks down the old hallways. Conversations, information, titles, songs, everything escaped his lips at a quickening pace, almost too much for him to keep up with. But, through all the chaos, Baralai was able to derive a pattern, and from that pattern, he formed a plan.
His smile curled upward, and his voice stopped. He turned to the nearest soldier, and he snapped his fingers, calling him over.
“Sir?” The soldier responded.
“P-p-prepare a t-t-transport.”
The soldier stared quizzically, “To where, sir?”
Baralai nodded, “Yes, yes. As it were.” And then he strolled off, mumbling too himself again. The soldier spoke over his communicator, telling the others to prep a transport for Baralai, and be ready to take off momentarily.