#oc: miraathis riskav

[mysterious-cuchulainn-x]

Born in Darkness

Inspired by @vihola's post about her Consular and Inquisitor swapping places, and the fact that I ended up listening to "They Rule the Battlefield" this morning.

Jedi Miraathis is, I think, a bit more cautious than he is as Inquisitor; his family's escape from the Empire impressed him with the value of risks but also exactly what "risk" in that sense means. Sith Talryn is... well, see below.

For fifteen thousand years, the Jedi stood as the guardians of peace and justice in the Galactic Republic. But the Jedi had an ancient enemy, a darkness once banished to the black gulfs of uncharted space... and five thousand years after it was thought destroyed, that darkness returned.

And that was the end of everything.

Fire engulfed the planet, burning in all gradients and kinds. The concentrated plasma of turbolaser fire, raining down from the cruisers that floated within sight overhead; the acrid, smoking conflagrations of ruptured power lines and flammable construction materials, ignited by the bombardment; the searing lines of lightsaber blades as the Sith marauded across the world.

Coruscant had fallen.

And the Jedi had fallen with her.

Not ten yards from Talryn, a bald Master lay with his armor cuirass melted to slag. His right arm lay considerably closer. And, standing over the body, a figure of solid darkness, his murderous red saber humming with intent as he strode forward...

"Child."

Talryn's breath caught in her throat.

"There is power in you, child," the Sith mused, growling, and Talryn's terror only grew. "These parasites would have wasted your potential. But I do not waste. Look upon your future, for I shall make you a sorcerer."

Talryn woke with a gasp, forcing her hammering heart to slow its pace as she reached out across the Desmodus, steadying herself on the presences of her followers.

It was the Jedi's fault, that zabrak scholar in the desert.

"If every you wish to speak, or to escape your situation, I will do all I can to be available and assist you."

Escape. Assist. Her.

So what if Lord Andern had lied, so what if she had clawed her way out of the slave pits with blood and lightning, so what if she was nothing but a murderer and a tool—she was Talryn of the line of Kallig, and she needed no one's pity.

But... was it truly pity?

Jedi were fools, weak and naive and incapable, but that scholar... they had not crossed blades, but he had held more than his own against the Rakatan terrors in that buried cave. Surely he knew what she was, and no Jedi would have granted that pity.

Or perhaps she had overestimated him, and he would return to wherever the Jedi had fled to when their temple burned, and in the smoldering salvage of their archives he would find her name—on public broadcasts from Balmorra, in rumors and stolen secvids from Nar Shaddaa—and realize in agony how deluded he had been.

And then they would cross paths again, and at her master's order she would kill him.

The Force shall set me free.

A lie, like all the rest. Crueler, perhaps, but inescapable: there was no freedom in the dark side, only crushing power. Better, for those who could still choose, to die rather than be bound as she had.

But that Jedi had not been moved—at least, not by terror.

"If you intend to unleash your cruelty on the galaxy," he had said, not to her but to that artificial revenant, the long-dead prisoner who had made his cage a weapon, "Then I will stop you here, before you can inflict more suffering."

Talryn's nails dug into her palms at the memory; to say such things in her presence, in the company of a Sith—

But that was when he had turned to her.

Turned to her, a shattered composite of malice, and offered his empathy. The fool. Deluded, light-blind, stumbling idiotically in a galaxy already burned to ash.

"There is light in all places," he had said, as though Dromund Kaas were not a place, "in all things. Some beings must be stopped, but the light can but be slowed. Block it, trap it, chain it; it will find a way. All that is required is the decision to do so."

And then he had made his offer.

"There is one way of the Force," Talryn had sneered, "It is the way of death and destruction. Choose to be destroyed if you like, but I will not be so fragile."

The zabrak bowed his head, keeping his judgement—his weakness—to himself, and Talryn scowled. At least a fight would end something, instead of this interminable, unofficial treaty.

"I travel for Alderaan next," he spoke again. "After that, I know not. I do know that the reach of the dark side is long and its grip hard. Its powers of distortion are terrible... but only you can decide who you are, and what it is that you desire. Can the dark side grant you that?"

With that, he had finally vanished, and now Talryn sat alone in her cabin, thinking on his words.

If she had been a moment faster—lightning down his back, screams of agony and betrayal—Zash's sickly, approving smile.

No.

The dead Master's corpse in her nightmare.

Lord Ardern, his heart destroyed by Force corruption and the pressures of his so-called pragmatic sorceries.

Marshall Cheketta and his Jedi guards, withered and dismembered at her own hands.

She was Talryn of the line of Kallig, heir to mysteries older than the Emperor. She had survived the first conquest of the Republic, survived Sith stewardship and slavery and Korriban. She was an acolyte of the dark side, ruthless and unforgiving...

...and it would not take a Jedi to tell that she was dying.

It was hardly a unique affliction among Sith, of course, at least if her own masters were any example. Those who commanded the Force would always overpower those who obeyed it, but the Force exacted a price in return.

What did she want?

Survival. Strength. What else was there?

What had she lost, that night before which nothing was left to her, and after which she had nothing at all?

[mysterious-cuchulainn-x]

Some Sentences Sunday/WIP Whenever

Thanks @starknstarwars for the tag!

Proof that A Dream of Small Minds is still under development:

“My lord? Er, Inquisitor?”

The Inquisitor, thus addressed, looked up, eyes narrowing as his gaze flicked over Miraathis’ hesitating figure, and then broke into an ear-to-ear grin as he stood with a booming laugh.

“You would be… ‘Miraathis,’ then,” he greeted, circling the desk to stand face-to-face with the zabrak—or as close as they could come to it, given the human’s exceptional stature. “One of Harkun’s, yes? Excellent. I am Inquisitor Zyn.”

He brushed past Miraathis with an offhanded, beckoning wave, leading the way toward the interrogation table. A second careless gesture activated the lights, and Miraathis repressed a wince at the sudden, harsh illumination—only to miss a step as he took in the sight of the bruised and battered human strapped down in front of him.

“This sniveling piece of refuse is called Alif,” Zyn continued jovially, as though he were talking about a favorite restaurant on the local spacedock. 

Alif was a little shorter and slighter than Miraathis, and covered in welts and bruises that had obviously been inflicted with moderate skill but meticulous care—more care, in Miraathis’ judgment, than usually went into preparing spaceport food. 

“He was recently witness to what we call an ‘unauthorized’ murder here at the Academy. Extract the killer’s name from him, however you’d like.”

Resentment curled in Miraathis’ gut, mirroring exactly the shape of the Inquisitor’s amused, anticipatory smile. 

“Yes, my lord.”

[mysterious-cuchulainn-x]

Tagged by @swtorpadawan to do this Greek tragic heroes uquiz for my OCs - Thanks!

Miraathis Riskav / Diaola Ziveri: Achilles

Sith Inquisitor: Male zabrak, aspirational LS, vengeful

Jedi Knight: Female twi��lek, firmly LS, protective

best of the greeks, eager for honor, and quick to rage: you could easily live content and easy until you're gray-haired, but glory and fame call for you just beyond the horizon. you are not prone to self-reflection and trip into the same pits of wrath at bruised pride over and over. are you truly ready to sacrifice everything so that your name will be immortalized? is your fury what you want to be remembered for?

(Interesting that these two got the same hero, given how different their attitudes and answers were/are.)

Talryn Starlighter: Patroclus

Jedi Consular: Female Kiffar-Arkanian, LS, unyielding compassion

clever patroclus, beloved patroclus, poor patroclus: you do fall into madness, nor vanity, nor hubris. not, that is, for your own sake. love for that golden-haired man, sorrow for your countrymen; it is for his name that you don his armor, and for the dying greeks that you ride into battle. every piece of you is willingly given away, even if after you are gone there are wicked things done in your name.

(This feels oddly appropriate for the Act 1 Consular in particular, even if “figure of terrible inspiration in battle” fits Talryn least of all these four.)

Lysandra Vael: Orestes

Sith Warrior: Female human, DS/neutral, honor + glory

you are your father's son and your mother's equal. morality and justice guide your hands through every act, no matter how vile, so that society may be preserved—even if you must sacrifice yourself. what is your flesh flayed by the kindly ones over your father being avenged? matricide, when sparing your mother would lose her respect for you? there is peace at the end, orestes, but the journey to it is dark and terrible.

(Once again, appropriate; she would do worse things than murder her own parental figures for the sake of honor and tradition/justice. And, like Orestes, character growth and changing circumstances may yet save her from fate’s requital.)

No-pressure tags for @starknstarwars​, @ftmshepard​

[mysterious-cuchulainn-x]

AO3 Meme

Thanks @starknstarwars for the tag!

Rules: Give us the links to your wonderful words with the Most hits, Most kudos, Most comments, Most bookmarks, Most words, and Least words.

🥇 Most Hits:

Kinktober 2019 (28,299) / Through Fire and Flood (9,055)

Summary: The hits leaders overall and under my primary username; despite separating out the fics that I posted under my smut-compilations pseud, that's exactly what TFF is, too—written for Zutara Smut Week in the ATLA fandom.

Thoughts: People read my smut, I guess? Which is fair, given how much I've written.

🥇 Most Kudos, Comments, Bookmarks:

(Silhouetting) The Snow on the Breeze

198 kudos

27 comments

48 bookmarks

Summary: Avatar - The Last Airbender AU working conceptually backward from Zuko's visit to the Western Air Temple—only revealed late in the canon show—and imagining a how things might have gone if that experience had affected him more strongly. Currently moored off the coast midway through Season 1, but to be continued once the log circles back around.

Thoughts: My first fic that got serious traffic in terms of responses — I still get the occasional fav/follow on one abandoned fic back on FFN, but the frequency and complimentary comments while I was actively writing/posting this one blew me away. Thanks to all of those people, and my apologies for my rare and sporadic comment responses.

🥇 Most Words:

"Unnatural Selection," Part 1 of A Dream of Small Minds (12,878)

Summary: From the colony of his birth to the tombs of Khar Delba, Miraathis Riskav has never known a life free of the Empire's lash. Lysandra Vael was raised knowing that power was hers to wield, following ancient honor—until her parents were murdered for their ideals. Now, ten years after the Treaty of Coruscant, both arrive on Korriban: One seeking to reform the Sith, the other to destroy them.

Thoughts: One of my many incomplete works, although the plan and intention are still there; I just need to get through the stuff that's ahead of it in the queue. Miraathis may not be my absolute favorite SWTOR OC, but he's where this series started and important to me, and Lysandra is a delight as well if also frustratingly contradictory. (Technically I've also written a much longer fic, but that need not be spoken of, and is coming down as soon as I get close to posting the first chunk of the rewrite—that's the queue that's holding up writing on this one.)

🥇 Fewest Words:

"Shadow of Intent" (355)

Summary: A brief look into the psyche of the Director of Project Freelancer as he tears his project, and himself, apart.

Thoughts: I had completely forgotten about this little snippet, but unlike some larger things I've written I think it still holds up fairly well, all the more so for dating back to my FFN days.

Tagging: This seems to have been going around for a bit, so I'll just add @ftmshepard and anyone else who wants to join in!

[mysterious-cuchulainn-x]

Shadows of the Lost

Miraathis stared at the corpse at his feet.

It had a hulking stature, with powerful muscles and exoskeletal plating that could only have been a product of Sith alchemy... but the now-rotting gourd that sat in place of its head was another matter entirely.

"Was that... a Dashade?" Ashara panted, looking disbelievingly from the fallen creature to the living one in their midst.

Khem Val grumbled in irritation.

Some part of that thing may share my people's blood, soft one, he growled, but that is no Dashade. Dashade do not have kolokythes for their heads.

"...Right."

Ashara frowned to match her master and backed away slightly from Khem and the dead thing alike. "My lord?"

"I can interrogate Zash when we return to the ship," the Dark Lord shook his head, "but I have never heard of a creature such as this."

There was a long moment of silent confusion, and then Miraathis' comlink chimed.

"Master Starlighter," he greeted, as the miniature form of the Jedi Bar'senthor appeared in his hand. "I take it you have encountered the same thing we have?"

"A Headless One, yes," the Jedi Master replied, sounding excited even as she nodded gravely. "Master Yuon always concluded—reluctantly—that they were merely hearsay, but it appears that this time there was indeed truth to the legend!"

Miraathis cocked his own head, confused.

"Headless Ones? I would have thought their heads to be their most... distinctive features."

Talryn laughed and shrugged apologetically.

"The naming conventions observed in such stories do not always make sense at first glance," she agreed, "although I suspect that, whatever these creatures are, the heads they bear now were not always their own."

It was a sobering answer but a sensible one, and Miraathis nodded in understanding. 

“Then the question that concerns us,” he reasoned, “is not what they are, but how and by whom they were created.”

“Agreed,” Talryn spoke decisively. “We’ve learned all we can for now in the field; I suggest we reconvene aboard ship and confer in detail. Nadia has... one theory, but I think group consideration wise before we commit, however tentatively, to an explanation.”

A wordless howl echoed from deeper in the lightless caverns, and Miraathis bared his teeth to repress the primal shiver it ignited in his spine.

“Agreed, Master Jedi. Let us speak again soon.”

“May the Force be with you, friend.”

Talryn’s image winked out, and Miraathis turned on his heel, striding with expeditious patience toward the exit of the catacombs. They were, perhaps, retreating from a fight, but not even Khem Val voiced a word of protest.

The image of a three-meter-tall un-Dashade topped with a flaming vegetable, Miraathis supposed, had that effect on sentients of any quality.

[mysterious-cuchulainn-x]

Miraathis as a Companion

Selection line:

A pleasure. Murder, or mayhem? Let’s go, then. If I must.

Battle lines:

I will see you burn! If you die quickly, it’ll hurt less! You chose this! [Maniacal laughter]

Exiting battle:

Hardly a challenge. So much for the might of the Empire. All dead. Fools.

Low health/KO’d:

I never die! You’re only making this harder on yourself. Not... yet...

Resurrected:

I told you I never die. Much better... my thanks. And now for revenge.

Misc. click lines:

I’m sorry, Kel’eth. I can’t.

[Nar Shaddaa] I should check up on my cult while we’re here. [Beat] I sound... odd saying it like that, don’t I?

[Alderaan] Such a lovely planet. It’s a shame about the Empire.

You know the worst thing about rain? Too much, and it makes it almost impossible to commit arson.

[Opera humming]

Thank you, for your trust. It means... more than I can truly say.

Gifts:

Cultural Artifacts [favorite]: I... this is remarkable, really. I am in your debt.

Republic Memorabilia, Luxury [love]: This is... lovely. Thank you, truly.

Weapon, Technology, Underworld [like]: Oh, you didn’t... Thank you, friend.

Imperial Memorabilia, Military Gear, Maintenance, Trophy [indifferent]: I’m sorry, what is this?

Likes: Kindness, courtesy, curiosity, helping the innocent/hindering the Empire

Dislikes: Cruelty, disrespect, apathy/egocentrism, aiding the Empire

Inspired by @fenrisprime2003​​, via @swtorpadawan​​

[mysterious-cuchulainn-x]

Six Sentence Sunday

Wow, it’s been a while. Haven’t done too much lately, but I’ve been rewriting "Unnatural Selection,” so here’s a bit of that extension:

The next morning, still sick with fury and regret, Miraathis reported with the rest of his cohort to the salle overseen by Lord Samus, the Academy’s resident saber master. Human, like all but a few Miraathis had glimpsed—those others being invariably red-skinned and tendril-faced—Samus was heavyset and buried his sadism beneath a professional focus that could have armored a star cruiser.

“I understand the lot of you were trained on Ziost,” he frowned, looking over the dozen of them as Miraathis had been looked at once before, over seven years ago. “Not sure who got it into their heads to have you all brought here, but it’s not my place to question lords of high repute. You, alien, step forward.”

Miraathis did so, the accustomed offense flickering beneath his skin, reined in tightly so as not to earn him a humiliating beatdown—or, worse, an outright execution.

“Yes, my lord?”

Samus narrowed his eyes.

“Mind your tone, acolyte, and be on your guard,” he ordered, and drew his lightsaber. “This is not a trial, but that does not mean I will forgive incompetence… or disrespect.”

He lunged swiftly, but not too swiftly for Miraathis to follow; the attack was shii-cho, although not a standard opening, and Miraathis parried easily.

Tagged by @swtorpadawan, tagging @ftmshepard

[mysterious-cuchulainn-x]

Character Bio: Miraathis Riskav

(Pictured in his favorite mask, bc you can’t make a dark-skinned zabrak Sith without playing a lot more than I have yet had time to.)

Full name: Miraathis Riskav, Lord Kallig

Appearance: Zabrak, 1.82 m, black hair, amber eyes, dark brown skin; lean to the point of seeming taller than he is, though not the point of looking frail. Has two large, outer horns, plus two smaller horns near the top of his forehead and one very small horn just below those; due to the circumstances of his childhood, Miraathis lacks either Sith or traditional zabrak tattoos.

Born: 11 BTC / 3664 BBY, mining colony on Nelvana III 

Likes (General): Jedi, history, compassion, revenge

Colors: Purple, green, amber. Not a fan of black but wears a lot of it for obvious reasons. Enjoys a bit of gold trim.

Food: Hot spices, fried gizka, dried fruits with dry bantha cheese

Drinks: Black or spiced tea, Corellian whiskey, Alderaanian wine

Dislikes: Casual cruelty, Imperials, slavery, Sith

Family: Namrask (father, deceased), Sao Gir (mother, deceased)

Fighting style: Single lightsaber (red initially; he eventually constructs an uncorrupted one, in addition to acquiring various sabers from Sith and other opponents who wouldn’t back down); his combat style is largely an approximation of Niman based on a combination of heavy Force use with basic Soresu and Makashi.

About the Sith:

Miraathis is the seed from which The Dream of Small Minds grew: The son of zabrak colonists enslaved when the Sith conquered their world, he grew up in a mining camp, raised on mythic-sounding stories of the time before and the double-hearted beat of resistance. Then the mine tapped out and he was sold away from everyone and everything he’d ever known, into the hands of the Imperial Reclamation Service.

(I’m going to have some fun with that, some day in the distant future.)

Although the Reclamation Service used him basically as a beast of burden, he was able, thanks in part to an irrepressible supervisor eager for a captive audience, to pick up a lot about Sith history in those days; this soured his opinion of the Sith as an order even further, and also fueled an enduring interest in the sort of research and judicious preservation the Service claimed to be about.

Eventually, he got himself an object lesson in the inclusion of the word “judicious,” and ended up shipped off to Ziost for training as one of those not-a-lord, not-an-apprentice Sith we see all over the place, hoping to eventually be sent off as a champion and defect at the first opportunity. But, after a couple years, Zash scooped him up instead, and the game plan changed from “run as far as possible as fast as possible as soon as possible” to becoming as powerful and as well-placed as possible in order to, in theory, cause damage on a scale and from a direction that no number of open Jedi and defectors could inflict.

There are, of course, problems with this plan, ranging from the existence of Imperial Intelligence and the sheer size of the Sith hierarchy to the circular or more accurately spiraling nature of dark-side Force use, and Miraathis struggles a lot, especially over the early part of the story, with the consequences of continually dredging up your darker emotions for power. Part of the reason he chooses infiltration over defection is to avoid an expected expectation to let go of his antagonism toward the Sith Empire, which is reasonable in itself but forces him through some difficult reflection and eventually even more difficult ideological tightrope walking, although by that point he is in a position where the plan itself looks a lot more reasonable.

Behind the Scenes: Miraathis’ horns share the same pattern as Agen Kolar’s, minus Agen’s lower four tiny horns.

Non-Star Wars Theme: “Nerevar Rising” (The Elder Scrolls Renewal: Skywind)

[mysterious-cuchulainn-x]

Wrath 2

For Miraathis:

This is a surprisingly tricky one. For all that Miraathis is surrounded by people and a society he hates, he doesn't tend to get really angry very much — it's mostly general resentment or personal hatred.

There are, however, at least two moments in his story that definitely get him angry. The first is meeting Lysandra and Vette: he and Lysandra had come to an accord of sorts in their last encounter, and despite knowing they weren't going to see eye to eye at all times Miraathis was unpleasantly surprised to see her acting like owning another sentient wasn't one of the things they could both agree sucked about the Empire. They didn't come to blows, but it was a close thing, and their relationship remained strained until sometime after Tatooine.

Then there's the moment that Miraathis learns about Selena's backstory, specifically what she went through with the SIS and the role the Dark Council and Imperial Intelligence played in setting her up. There's no one to stab there, but he goes into a sort of glacial rage: at the Republic for violating their principles, and at Intelligence for betraying even one of their own in that manner (He's on the Dark Council by this point, he knows they have no limits). The whole galaxy is lucky that Selena had already handled her affairs by then.

Finally, an extra: ADoSM goes off the rails, for both OC decision-making and broader background reasons alike, before the whole Revan/Vitiate arc, including the Tython raid. But being sent to attack children, in the heart of the Jedi Order's sanctuary, as a diversion? Darth Arkous would have choked and died without Imperius twitching a muscle.