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swtorpadawan · 1 year ago

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Unmasked

Author’s Notes: The following story takes place in my Nas Legacy as part of my Monsters and Masks series. Content warnings for original character death, some blood/gore and bigotry towards non-humans. Lots of angst, here, folks.

Nas'haes'uhme – Shaesu to those few in the Empire who deigned to address her by her own name – collapsed upon the rocky ground of Korriban, her vibro-blade falling out of her hand.

She knew it was over for her.

The stab wound to her torso was already bleeding out, and her attackers were unlikely to give her any respite. Her strength was fading rapidly with her limbs barely responding to her commands. She certainly couldn’t muster the strength to stand, much less defend herself.

Haes – her proper given name as a Chiss – had come to this accursed world in the hopes of earning a place amongst the Sith. She ’d been aware that the odds had been against her; she was starting out several years older than the average Sith Acolyte at the academy and besides that she faced considerable discrimination from her ‘fellow pupils’, virtually all of whom were human or Pureblooded Sith. It had immediately made her a target. Even the former Jedi who had been broken and turned to the dark side held an advantage over her in experience if not philosophy.

Of course, had matters gone otherwise, Haes would never have chosen to come to Korriban for Sith training at all.

Two years ago, after the death of her husband (killed by fighting in someone else’s war, she didn’t need to remind herself), Haes had been exiled from the Chiss Ascendancy when her Force sensitivity had been revealed to the authorities. With few connections outside of her own people, the Sith Empire was the only viable place she could go. And as a Force-sensitive, Sith training was the only real path open to her.

Above her stood her attackers, glaring down at their victim. Hanik, a human, and Mathiren, a Sith Pureblood. The two acolytes had ambushed her as she’d stepped outside of the tomb, the ancient tablet she’d recovered laying shattered where she’d dropped it.

It shouldn’t have surprised her that these two would have chanced such a cowardly move out here, so far from the relative safety of the Sith Academy. With their modest individual abilities, they’d have known they couldn’t have taken her on their own in a straight-up fight, certainly not without alerting the Overseers.

They had provoked and even bullied her many times these last few months, and for reasons that were understandable to the Sith mindset. After all, she was alone. A minority of one, without natural friends or allies. She could count on one hand the number of Acolytes on Korriban who were not either human or pureblooded.

And if she was not the first Chiss to ever step down upon this cursed rock, she would have been astonished.

As she felt her breath start to go shallow, her thoughts naturally turned to her children. They’d been the only reason why she had pushed herself even this far.

She wondered what the Empire, and indeed the galaxy itself, would do to them without her being alive to protect them.

She had been heart-broken when she’d left them with the Nedecca family on Dromund Kaas while she’d headed off to Korriban.She was not entirely fond of the couple, who had served in the Imperial Military alongside her husband before he’d been killed in the fighting against the Republic. But they were the closest thing she had to friends in the Empire. They were also not unambitious; if Haes had succeeded in her goal of becoming a Sith and eventually a Sith Lord, they knew they’d be well-rewarded for their aid. For them, fostering a pair of ‘alien children’ had been worth the bother.

But now, in light of her failure to survive and advance, she didn’t think they would do much to protect them, even if they could. They were a practical couple. Besides, they had their own daughter to consider, a few years older than her own children, just last season entering the Imperial Academy on Ziost.

They would not risk either their own lives or their daughter’s future by defying the Sith for a pair of non-human children who were not their own.

She was worried for Nas’ash’dia, of course. It had been months since she’d seen the last holo of Ash. At twelve years old, Haes was leaving her lovely daughter behind at the precipice of womanhood. But she also knew her clever daughter was a survivor; if any non-human child could survive being orphaned in the Sith Empire, then Nas’ash’dia could.

But loath though she was to play favorites, she felt greater concern for Nas'laeso'ucu.

Where his sister was highly intelligent and resourceful, her son Laeso was brilliant. Even as a small child back on Copero, his curiosity and intellect were far beyond Haes’ ability to comprehend, as he would devour book after book. Even then, she and her husband had privately spoken about the limitless future their son had before him. No endeavor would be outside his potential. Now at eight years old, his intellect intimidated the Nedeccas, who observed this young Chiss boy easily pass every test their teaching droid could put to him.

But his intelligence was not what worried Haes. No. She’d gone to great lengths to conceal that Laeso was Force-sensitive.

If his abilities were discovered with her death, he’d follow his mother’s path to Korriban soon enough, likely with the same destiny.

If his abilities were not discovered, his fate might be even grimmer. The Sith of Korriban were usually at least quick. She couldn’t imagine how long a frail child such as Laeso would survive mining ore on some distant slave mine facility.

Haes felt a tear trail down her cheek.

“Hey, she’s still breathing.” Hanik jeered, the insult snapping her consciousness back to reality. “Think this alien schutta is asking for more?”

The anger flared within Haes’ chest, refocusing her thoughts. The building rage was not for herself, but for her children. Her magnificent children who she would never see again and who would almost certainly suffer greatly in her absence. As her teeth gritted in fury, her finger reached out.

Behind Hannik, Haes’ vibroblade lifted off the ground…

The Sith Acolyte screamed out as the weapon impaled him through the back, jutting out of his chest. Blood sprayed out over the rocks, much of it raining down on her.

She smiled at the sensation, the hot, fresh blood of her slain enemy warming her even as the last of her strength and rage was exhausted. Her blade clattered to the ground.

Alarmed at his companion’s sudden demise, Mathiren frantically raised his blade to finish her off.

Haes could only reflect on her legacy.

She’d worn a mask for years to protect her children, desperately attempting to become something she wasn’t.

In these final moments of her life, she was, in fact, a Sith.

As the blade swung down and her life came to an end, Haes could only hope her children would learn to survive by wearing their own masks, without becoming monsters.

Fifteen years later…

The assembled members of the Dark Council of the Sith Empire – ostensibly the twelve most powerful Sith in the galaxy – stood in their council chamber on the top floor of the Sith Academy of Korriban.

Perilous as the existence of any Sith could be, the death of one who sat upon the Dark Council was still considered a remarkable event, even when it was the second such death they had witnessed in less than an hour.

By necessity, this Council meeting had already been well short of a full dozen in physical attendance.

Three of their number – Darth Decimus, Darth Acharon and Darth Hadra – the heads of the Spheres of Military Strategy, Biotic Science and Technology, respectively – were appearing by holoprojection as they’d been committed to overseeing the Empire’s flagging efforts on Corellia.

Three more Councilors – Darth Rictus, the oldest serving member of the Council who commanded the Sphere of Mysteries, Darth Zhorrid, the youngest Councilor who nominally presided over the Sphere of Imperial Intelligence and Darth Aruk who led the Sphere of Sith Philosophy – were entirely absent. Rictus was occupied investigating rumors into the whereabouts of the rogue Sith Lord Darth Jadus, himself a former Councilor and the father of Darth Zhorrid. Zhorrid’s own absence was no great surprise, given the Council’s recent dissolution of the Empire’s once-feared Imperial Intelligence service. No doubt, the young Sith was desperately trying to cling to her crumbling power base. Meanwhile, Aruk was absent while dealing with some dissident conspiracy on the capital world of Dromund Kaas.

A seventh Dark Lord – Darth Baras, who had taken control of the Sphere of Military Offense after Darth Vengean’s fall – had been killed in this very chamber earlier in this session by his former Apprentice in a private duel. That Apprentice had in turn successfully claimed the title of the Emperor’s Wrath before departing.

Finally, an eighth – Darth Thanaton, who had represented the Sphere of Ancient Knowledge for less than a year – now lay freshly dead on the floor.

That left a mere four Dark Lords of the Sith physically present to mark Thanaton’s passing, and to stand witness for what was now to come.

It may have been Darth Mortis who had delivered the death blow to Thanaton in a mercy-killing to preserve the dignity of the Council, but no one could deny the potency of the strange, masked Sith who had just bested their former colleague in a Force duel with a brilliant display. His build was slight and his lineage was unclear; there had supposedly been a ‘Lord Kallig’ many centuries ago in the days of Tulak Hord, but that was ancient history, and the name representing little more than a footnote in the modern Sith Empire.

Nevertheless, despite his unassuming posture and his much-maligned origins, the upstart projected an air of power about them, and not simply because they had just witnessed him crushing one of their number. Thanaton’s time on the Council may have been relatively brief and more than a few found him tedious, but none would have questioned his personal power when he’d succeeded Darth Arctis some months ago.

Off to the side stood the newcomer’s two seconds; a Dashade shadow-assassin and a Kaleeshi Sith Apprentice. Strictly speaking, protocol demanded that the peculiar duo should have remained outside the council chambers, along with their master. None had been properly invited into the chamber. But as it was apparent that Thanaton’s followers guarding the door had failed in that simple task of security (as they had been repeatedly outmaneuvered over the last several weeks during the Kaggath between the two Sith), no one on the Council had bothered to force their eviction. As they had not actively interfered in the fight with Thanaton, to the assembled Dark Lords, they were irrelevant.

The masked Sith Lord paused at that, regarding Mortis, then turning towards the seat in consideration. Finally, he turned back to address all the assembled members of the Council.

“My lords, I’m… I’m truly honored.” He finally spoke; his voice was clear through the filter of the mask, though it was rather lighter than one might have expected from a young Sith Lord who had dared so much.

“I was not expecting this at all.”

The words were humble.

None of the Sith present believed they were sincere, but such was to be expected.

Such considerations were, once again, irrelevant. The strong had overcome the weak. The corrupt had been cleansed.

The ways of the Sith had been preserved, as Thanaton had insisted.

“You just killed a Dark Council member in fair combat.” Darth Marr, the head of the Sphere of Military Defense, pointed out, his iconic masked face looking up from Thanaton’s fallen form.

“What did you expect?”

The deliberations were not without protest.

“He’s only a lord!” Darth Ravage, who ruled the Sphere of Expansion and Diplomacy, was incredulous. “You can’t put a lord on the Dark Council!”

“Quiet, Ravage!” Marr snapped at his junior Councilor. “He’s earned his place.”

The young Sith Lord who had been the subject of the argument tilted his head at the exchange, as if carefully considering something. Finally, his hands reached up behind his head as he unclasped the skull-mask he was wearing, letting it fall away.

A collective gasp could be heard from several members of the Council, including those observing by holo. Ravage visibly gaped while Darth Vowrawn, the head of the Empire’s Sphere of Production and Logistics, chuckled to himself at the revelation. Only Marr and Mortis maintained something approaching a professional decorum, standing in a stoic silence.

The face before them was young; this was no surprise. Everyone knew that Thanaton’s opponent in the Kaggath was an upstart. The face was likewise heavily scarred; the defects crisscrossed him from old injuries. That was also not a surprise; Thanaton himself had protested that this interloper had once been a slave before becoming Zash’s apprentice, and more than a few slaves in the Empire bore such scars.

No. What had startled many of the Councilors was the fact that the face looking back at them was blue with glowing red eyes that regarded each of them with a cool intellect that might have unsettled the Emperor himself.

Incredibly, this newest addition to the Dark Council was a Chiss.

“Are we really going to allow this… this alien filth to sit on the Dark Council?”

If Ravage had been incredulous before, he was now fast becoming apoplectic, looking around the room to his assembled fellows.

“Without even consulting with the Emperor whom we are sworn to serve?” he spat.

“Enough, Ravage.” Darth Marr waved a dismissive hand.

Ravage’s ploy had been obvious. The Emperor, it was well known, rarely took an active role in day-to-day Council matters, even to name a replacement. It could be months – if not longer – before he made his will known.

For a Sith like Darth Marr, who had lived long enough to observe Thanaton’s rise from slave to apprentice of a disgraced master to Sith Lord to Dark Lord of the Sith, such a gap in the Empire’s leadership structure would be unacceptable.

He turned and acknowledged the latest addition to the Dark Council.

”As I have said, he has earned to right to that seat.”

Minutes later, the newly appointed Dark Councilor of the Sphere of Ancient Knowledge made his exit from the chambers, Khem Val and Xalek in tow. The Kalesshi held the discarded Kallig mask in his hands, carrying it reverently.

He had worn many names while walking along the path that had led him to this point.

He was departing from this planet – a planet that had forged him in so many ways – as Darth Imperious of the Empire’s Dark Council. In and of itself, this name meant nothing to him, aside from the authority that had come with it. He accepted that it now referred to him by anyone within the Sith Empire.

Prior to this, he had been commonly known as Lord Kallig. This name had been inadvertently stolen; the consequence of a delusional ancient Force ghost misidentifying him at the Dark Temple on Dromund Kaas. Nevertheless, he accepted that the name had granted him a degree of credibility within the Empire. Regardless, as was now the case with his Dark Councilor title, that name personally meant nothing to him.

For most of his life, he had been called ‘Ozibaumnu’. That name’s origins had been meaningless from the first moment he’d uttered it; a series of barely coherent syllables muttered on the day he’d been sold into slavery as a child. It had nevertheless come to symbolize a breaking with his past, from before he had worn a slave collar. For that small circle of people he now called friends – Ashara, Andronikos and Talos – from them, he would continue to accept that name. From anyone else, it would now be as meaningless in effect as well as in fact.

But none of those names had ever really been his.

His name was Nas'laeso'ucu. Son of Nas'haes'uhme. Brother to Nas’ash’dia.

And regardless of whether he ever used that name aloud, he would never wear a mask again.

END

Author’s Notes: Just in case it wasn’t obvious, several lines of dialogue in this piece were pulled directly from the end of the Sith Inquisitor story on Korriban.

Ozibaumnu’s name originally had a different, more Chiss-appropriate origin. Unfortunately, I lost the notes on that, and when I reread the Chiss naming conventions article, I realized that it didn’t make sense. This is my best effort to reconcile all of those continuity issues. On a related note, ‘Shaesu’ is pronounced ‘Shay-sue’, while ‘Laeso’ is pronounced ‘Lay-sue’ and Nas’ash’dia is pronounced ‘Nazz-osh-dee-ah’, even though her personal name is usually pronounced ‘Ash’. (Yeah, I know Chiss names are weird.)

This story was originally two separate chapters, with Shaesu’s titled What We Leave Behind. The combination of the two seemed to work. (I do love before-and-after stories.)

As stated elsewhere, I’m ignoring Chiss aging rules. As far as I’m concerned, they are approximately the same standard as humans.

Now for the elephant in the room I inserted near the end – yup. Ozibaumnu is NOT the actual descendant of Lord Kallig. I may address this in future stories, but it’s been an idea I’ve been turning over in my head for a long time.

The referenced daughter of the Nedecca family later becomes a Major in the Imperial Army and an NPC in the game. She shows up on Corellia in the Imperial Agent storyline, serving as an aid to Lord Razer. As you might imagine, her reunion with Nas’ash’dia was rather awkward.

I always thought it was hilarious that Darth Ravage was heading the Empire’s “Sphere of Expansion and Diplomacy”, considering he’s one of the least diplomatic Sith in the entire game. On that note, tracking the Dark Council members and their assignment Spheres is a pet-project of mine.

The reasons for the Ascendancy to join forces with an Empire (that usually doesn’t see Chiss as people much less equals) are convoluted and I hope to explore those in the future. But it seemed to make sense that the children of an exile and failed Sith acolyte would be pressed into slavery, rather than being sent back to their people.

I’ve written about Nas’ash’dia elsewhere. It is strange to me that she predated Ozi – and is in fact the Outlander in my Nas Legacy – and yet I’m more comfortable writing about her brilliant but traumatized brother. More about Ash in the future, I hope.

People continuing to fight after being shot or stabbed in the chest is a pet peeve of mine. In real life, that (almost) never happens. The strength just drains right out of you. I try to adhere to reality here with Shaesu.

Thank you for reading, and may the Force be with you.

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