Post by Tunnel Rat on Apr 18, 2014 16:16:29 GMT -5
I'm going to wait until Aurai is accepted to finish adding in the "RP elements" as I call them into the bio (Via links to the Blast From the Past area). The profile itself is done, it's just little things that I want added into the profile.
Name: Aurai Exitialis
Race: Human
Age: 22
Height: 5'8”
Weight: 160lbs
Appearance:
(Image Originally by Keiii)
Aurai has calming, almost angelic features. With no blemishes, dark side corruption, or anything else the Sith generally have marring their faces and bodies, Aurai can sometimes be mistaken for a simple civilian, depending on what he's wearing. His eyes are the same sapphire of his lightsaber blade and can seem to glow from time to time depending on how one looks at them. He keeps his light brown hair at shoulder length.
Personality
Aurai seems like a very calm, collected, and even apathetic person. He walks slow and deliberately as if he doesn't have a care in the galaxy. He rarely shows emotion, which gives an almost fear inducing ability to seem apathetic towards everything. It is all a trained cover that those who get to know Aurai would find out and be able to sense. Therein lies the problem, Aurai isn't very sociable.
Though coming a long way since his birth, Aurai is still by no means a sociable person. He keeps to himself mostly, and when talking with others he is quiet and doesn't have much to say aside from a need-to-know basis. Standing up to the largest of oppenents with ten times his strength is easy for Aurai to charge head-long into, but put him in a room by himself with another person, especially a girl, and he gets nervous.
Most people are at their element when they are deceiving, or bartering, or even teaching. Aurai is in his element when he's in combat. He loves the art of killing with a blade, and knows all too well that it is a love that will eventually kill him. The young man is afraid of girls, but fears nothing of death.
Birth place:Ravelin, Bastion
Faction: Dark Jedi
Rank: Marauder
Lightsaber: Single Blade (Single Phase)
Color: Sapphire
Practiced Lightsaber forms:
Shii-Cho 5
Ataru 3
Shien / Djem So 1
>>Sub-form Backhanded
Force-Sensitive Abilities or practices:
Telekinetic: 4
Telepathic: 3
Body: 7
Sense: 5
Protection: 1
Healing: 0
Destruction: 1
Specialized Skills:
Attributes:
Physical Strength: 6
Intelligence: 5
Speed: 7
Leadership: 1
Unarmed: 5
Melee Weapons: 6
Ranged Weapons: 1
Bio:
The Birth
1 – 4
Jessika knew better than to to love, yet she did so anyway. She met a young man by the name of Vance. He captivated her imagination with stories of the star beyond Bastion, and the frightening things he had done. It didn't take long for Jessika to fall for Vance, and when she did, she fell hard. Normally it wouldn't have been a problem, but Jessika was a slave to a Dark Jedi know as Kadamar. The relationship she had with Vance, who was simply a spacer doing business with Jessika's master, was forbidden to her. It didn't stop her from giving Vance everything she had left to give, which he took with promises of returning again someday. Jessika had his child, whom she named Alex. Vance never returned, and Jessika faced the wrath of her master.
Alex was given to another slave woman after the Dark Jedi killed Jessika for defying his laws. The woman in charge of raising Alex into a life of servitude was named Kelli. For all Alex knew, Kelli was his mother, having been asleep and too young to have any memory of his real mother. The more he grew and became conscious of what was happening around him, the more Kadamar hated him. Alex helped Kelli with her duties as a chef for the Sith Lord, and tried to keep out of trouble as much as possible, though it had a way of finding him. Kadamar would tell the boy everyday that was simply a replacement; that was entire role in life.
A Savior
5-7
When Alex was five years old his Lord traveled to Korriban with Alex and the rest of the slaves. They were shackled and marched in a line to the starport, where they were crammed into a small shuttle that would travel separate from the Kadamar's grand vessel, and then marched single file again once on Korriban. The whole experience took five agonizing days, and when they had finally landed on Korriban, nearly a quarter of the slaves were ill.
Alex soon realized the the easy part was behind him when his Lord forced the slave to march to the Valley of the Dark Lords. The journey would take two weeks. The slaves weren't fed, they weren't bathed, and they weren't cared for. Alex couldn't help but feel relieved that every time one of the slaves dropped out of the line, it at least wasn't him. He just stayed close to Kelli for what little protection and comfort she could provide.
Her providing anything to the young boy was short lived on the forced march. Only seven days into it, Kelli suffered a heat stroke and died. Alex tried to wake her up, tears in his eyes, but was pushed forward by the guards. He was forced to leave the woman he thought to be his mother in the dirt, where she wouldn't rest in peace, but rather become food for the creatures tailing the line of slaves like vultures. Alex was devastated; he cried and whimpered until his voice gave out and he had nothing left to cry out.
Finally, after a two week journey of death where nearly a third of the slaves died, they reached the Valley of the Dark Lords. They entered through a small ravine that acted as a funnel for anyone or thing entering or exiting; it made the life of the troopers on the other side guarding the passage way easier. Alex followed the rest of the slaves up toward the Valley itself where they would be put to work, until an acolyte shoved Alex to the ground. Two of the acolyte's friends joined him and they surrounded Alex.
They beat Alex with their fists and kicked him as he curled up in a ball. Alex couldn't call for help, and he couldn't cry because his body had no more fluids left to cry. When Alex about to give up, he saw a curved dagger laying, unnoticed by the acolytes beating him. He crawled, slowly, and painfully to it, picked it up, and stabbed one of the acolytes. The other two stood, stunned by what they witnessed as Alex was finally able to get to his feet and hold the dagger between the acolytes and himself.
The two remaining acolytes attacked Alex again, and Alex killed them both with the dagger. He had acted on instinct for survival, and as he looked at the destruction he wrought, he fell to his knees and whimpered. It was then that a Dark Jedi by the name of Exitialis came to Alex. He explained that he had placed the dagger there to see what the boy was capable of, and having seen Alex in action, was going to take Alex as an apprentice. Exitialis renamed the boy, calling him Aurai, saying that the boy's old life was dead and that he needed a name fitting of a Dark Jedi.
Despite Aurai's young age, his training started immediately. Ordered to keep the curved dagger, Aurai began learning the disciplines of the Dark Side. He was the only apprentice to Exitialis, so he was able to take in all the Dark Jedi had to give him rather than compete with some of the older apprentices. Aurai was small and weak in comparison to the others he would see around Korriban, but it wouldn't be long.
As soon as Aurai was able to channel the Force through him, at the young age of six, Exitialis began the boy's training in combat. His training in combat began as soon as his "classes" were finished with some of Exitialis' fellow Dark Jedi. Exitialis had Aurai practicing stances at first, and then simple punches and kicks. By the time Aurai had turned seven, a year after starting the combative training, he had learned opened palm strikes, knife hands, elbows and knees, and was learning grappling and joint manipulation. The boy was still very young and impressionable, and he had made just as much progress learning about the Force as he had in his hand to hand training.
Aurai never forgot where he came from, as he sparred against slave boys his age and little bit older. He pushed the memories of Kelli to the back of his mind and focused on learning as much as he could. Even at that young age, Aurai knew that he had been given an incredibly lucky break from the way his life had been. Exitialis rarely ever spoke to Aurai unless it was for training purposes, so the day he sat Aurai down to talk was a very rare chance.
Exitialis explained a lot of things about life as a Dark Jedi and how difficult it would be for Aurai. He told Aurai that it was his life's meaning to make sure Aurai was ready for what was to come, whatever that may be, and that when Aurai was older, Exitialis would send him on missions that would test everything Aurai was as a being.
Aurai asked why Lord Exitialis had saved him from the three acolytes. Exitialis patted the boy on the head with a smile, and told him that when Aurai could figure such things out on his own, then he would no longer need a Master. With that, Aurai entered a new chapter in his training, both on the combat and Force fronts.
You Are But A Blade
8 - 12
Aurai's hand to hand combat started encompassing the dagger more and more, though the focus of Exitialis' training switched to actual swordsmanship. Instead of a training saber, like most apprentices would get, Exitialis gave Aurai a vibrosword. Exitialis told Aurai the reasoning behind it; a training saber is light in weight and killing power. Aurai would become stronger while using a real, heavy blade, a blade that could protect Aurai given the dangerous surroundings of Korriban.
The first lessons were how to hold the sword. Being only eight years old, Aurai had to hold the sword with both hands just to keep it from touching the ground. Once Aurai understood how to hold the hilt correctly, Exitialis set him about his first lesson: consistency and discipline. Aurai would stand facing a large pillar and make overhead, two handed strikes on the pillar while stepping forward and backward, taking turns with which foot would be lead.
By the time Aurai was ten years old, he could hold the vibrosword with one hand and manipulate in many different directions but was still focusing on sparring the dull, stone pillar in front of him. This is where, though he became stronger and more disciplined, his Force abilities began to rise more than his swordsmanship, or so it seemed.
Aurai was able to manipulate the Force in small ways now. He could sense things beyond his body, like what people were feeling and their emotions, but it was still unreliable at best. He could lift objects and move them around at will, though he couldn't hold them for very long or control them as he could with a blade. Aurai had only started learning how to manipulate the Force within his own body to give himself added energy, strength, and speed.
At the age of ten, Aurai's mind was maturing faster than a normal boy's thanks to the Force and his training. He began to grasp the concepts around the core Force powers that all Force users knew, regardless of what side they were on. Everyday he would train in the Force until the other Dark Jedi grew tired of his questions, and when he returned to Exitialis after those classes, he would spend hours upon hours in front of the stone pillar and sparring against the slave children to keep up with his hand to hand.
By the age of twelve, Aurai was comfortable enough with the Force that he could use it on a day to day basis without really needing to think about it. He had grown fascinated by the way the Force could augment his body. He would begin swinging his vibrosword at the stone pillar to begin that night's combat training with his Master, and after a while he would begin to use the Force to augment certain muscles and tendons to see the effect it would have on the pillar. It was during this experimentation phase that Aurai fell in love with the combat side of the Dark Side. When Aurai told Exitialis that he didn't care about the advanced Force powers and that he wanted to learn how to fight like a Marauder, Exitialis was pleased.
Thy Bidding
12 – 16
As soon as Aurai had told his Master that he wanted to focus on combat rather than the Force, his training intensified beyond anything he had imagined. His mornings were filled with exercises meant to exhaust him, forcing him to draw on the Force for the added strength, speed, and endurance it gave. Instead of sparring with slave children in hand to hand, Aurai was pit up against other apprentices who were allowed to use their training sabers. His swordsmanship consisted of the same, simple direction based, two handed strikes as before. At noon, after a meal that would be on par with slave rations, Aurai would pick up a training saber, only to simulate the weight of a real lightsaber, and Exitialis began teaching him Shii-Cho.
Aurai picked up the fundamentals of Shii-Cho very quickly, having already been introduced to most of them with his training with the vibrosword. Lord Exitialis was right in the beginning when he had given Aurai the sword rather than a training saber. Between the exercise and the constant training with a heavy blade, Aurai was fast with a training saber. His movements were blurs to some, even without the Force to augment him.
Exitialis had told Aurai that he would be tested via missions that Exitialis would send him on. He got was given his first mission at the age of fourteen. It would be the mission that would determine whether or not Aurai would be given permission to construct his own lightsaber. It was a live or die, mission, meaning that if Aurai succeeded, he lived, if not, he died.
Aurai found himself walking down into the Valley of the Dark Lords. His mission was to find an apprentice by the name of Yal Drogul who was busy trying to find an artifact for his own master, Kadamar. What Exitialis had against Aurai's former slaver, he didn't know, but it no longer mattered to Aurai. All thoughts of Kelli and the slave life he had left behind, he looked in the dearest of hindsight; it was a chapter in his life that was gone and would never return while he was still breathing.
Armed with his vibrosword, curved dagger, and the Force, Aurai made his way to the tomb of Tulak Horde. It was there, in the middle of a crumbling chamber, that Aurai found Yal Drogul. The apprentice was larger than him by two feet, and more muscular than Aurai could ever hope to be. Yal was chipping pieces of the stone away with his lightsaber. The crimson blade caught Aurai's attention more than the artifact that Yal was trying to cut out of the chamber's center pillar did. It was a death sentence for Aurai to confront Yal, and Aurai figured that Exitialis knew it as well. Aurai wouldn't go down without a fight, though, and he planned on taking at least half of Yal with him.
Yal sensed Aurai's entrance and turned to face the younger apprentice. The older apprentice shot insults and goads from his tongue. Aurai hadn't learned to be very social, especially with those he was fighting, so he stayed silent. Giving up on the insults and trying to goad Aurai into making the first move, something Aurai knew would end him if he tried, Yal charged and the fight began.
What Yal had in strength, Aurai had in speed. Aurai had been trained enough to be able to see strikes and where they would land or pass based on his own movements. Enough spars and trained him to be patient, though too much could mean a drawn out fight, which drew much more attention. Aurai dodged and parried Yal's attacks, while Yal simply blocked Aurai's. The heavy set of the vibrosword hindered Aurai from being faster than Yal could compensate for, which gave the monster of a young man the advantage over Aurai, who couldn't rely on strength at all.
The fight lasted longer than Aurai was expecting. Finally, Yal's endurance faltered, and Aurai seized the opportunity, driving his vibrosword through the older apprentice's neck. Aurai watched Yal fall and choke on his own blood until he was dead. He watched the light in the young man's eyes fade, and with it, so too did the light in his own eyes. His features became apathetic for a moment until something made him have the uncontrollable urge to laugh. Aurai stood above the body of his victom, laughing hysterically with tears streaming down his cheeks. Laughing so hard felt amazing to Aurai, who had rarely even smiled in his life. His uncontrollable spurt of laughter changed his life forever.
It was several hours after Yal had fallen when Aurai returned to Exitialis with Yal's lightsaber and the artifact he was excavating. Aurai kept the fact that he had buried the older apprentices body to himself, guarding it with walls that even his Master couldn't penetrate. Exitialis was pleased with Aurai's work, though Aurai had quite a few bruises and scratches from the fight. His Master gave Aurai a day to recover, and then gave him his next assignment: to obtain his lightsaber.
Aurai focused on the words of his Master; he was to “obtain” his lightsaber. He didn't need to make it, or to find it, but to obtain it. Yal's lightsaber would have done, if he didn't care that the blade and hilt weren't a direct reflection of himself. Exitialis had said that the lightsaber is an extension of one's arms, and Aurai didn't like the idea of someone else's arm attached to his. He made his decision: Aurai would make his own.
The first step, was gathering the materials needed. Aurai spent weeks scavenging through the tombs of old Dark Lords finding all of the pieces he would need. The only thing he needed after that, was a crystal. Due to the lack of color variety, Aurai was forced to use the synthetic, red crystal from Yal's lightsaber. Aurai laid all the pieces out on the floor in front of him and meditated on them with the Force, something he had never practiced before.
The hilt began to click into place as Aurai projected himself into the lightsaber. The pieces that he had picked up in many different shades and colors, turned black, while the highlights of the tightening rings of the lens and the pummel turned silver. The tukata hide strips he had acquired wrapped around the hilt, fusing itself with the hilt. The dark brown of the leather turned to a crimson as the Force heated and cooled the objects, fluctuating between Aurai's moods as he walked through his entire life up to that point. When Aurai opened his eyes, it was two days later and his lightsaber lay in his hands. Despite having completed the task of obtaining a lightsaber, Aurai wasn't happy with it. Every part, color, and chip was a part of him, except the crystal, which was a hole that he could never fill no matter how much he tried.
With the construction of his lightsaber, Aurai picked up where he left off in lightsaber training. Lord Exitialis had had time to gauge his apprentice over the years, making the ultimate decision to teach Aurai the Ataru form. Aurai's days were filled, morning to night, with training once again. Aurai would be awake and exercising before the Korriban first rays of sun breached the night sky. Due to dwindling rations, Aurai had trained himself to subdue hunger with the Force, but he ate when he would scarf a quick breakfast down everyday after his morning exercises. The first half of the day was spent revisiting the Shii-Cho form. The later half of the day was spent learning the Ataru form.
Aurai was thoroughly excited to be learning the Ataru form. It fit the young apprentice like a glove. By the age of sixteen, Aurai had learned the fundamentals of the Ataru form and could use the form with increasing ease and ability.
Battle of Sapphire
16 – 18
As Aurai matured, Exitialis trusted him with more and more. By the age of sixteen, Exitialis trusted his apprentice with off-world missions. It started with little missions here and there to retrieve small bits of information or to do Exitialis' bidding with a client of his. The most notable, however, was a mission that ended up lasting several weeks.
Exitialis sent Aurai to the planet Ossus. The mission was to recover yet another artifact for his Master, though when Aurai finally stepped on the planet of Ossus, he knew it would harder to find the artifact than he first thought. What would have normally been a routine mission, soon became an expedition to find the artifact his Master wanted.
It took the young apprentice two weeks to find the artifact, and with it, he found a strange, cloudy crystal. He could hear whispers in the Force coming from the crystal, but kept shrugging the feeling off. Finally, Aurai's curiosity got the better of him, and before he left Ossus, he started meditating on the crystal.
The crystal took him to a place within himself. A desert stretched on for what seemed like miles in every direction and was completely walled in by impassable mountains. A man who looked to be in his mid-twenties, though his features were hidden under black robes, crimson armor, and a cloth mask that covered the lower half of his face. The man asked why Aurai had come to his layer. After a long, ineffectual conversation, Aurai awakened from his trance to find that whole hours had passed. His curiosity wasn't cured, and he meditated on the cloudy crystal again.
During the second visit with the being living within the crystal, the being asked Aurai what it was that he fought for. Why had Aurai survived up until now. When Aurai couldn't answer the question, the being attacked. Aurai fought the being to a stand still, though it took more out of him than he would have liked to admit. He woke up the next morning with no recollection of ever falling asleep, and immediately went back into the crystal to confront the being.
On the third attempt, the desert, which had started changing since the second trance, was covered with rolling hills and buildings. The being screamed at Aurai, accusing him of corrupting the being's layer. Aurai took a new approach to the being, and commanded that he bend to his will. The being attacked, and again the two fought to a stand still. Again Aurai woke up the next morning, and having had enough to the being within the crystal, once more entered the trance.
The desert had become a city with ships flying out into the atmosphere. The mountains that formed the walls around the city were lit up and began displaying architectural designs. The being appeared again. Aurai demanded that it bend to his will. The being refused to unless Aurai could fully tame it. Aurai attacked this time. Where the previous two encounters had come up inconclusive, this time Aurai knew exactly what he was fighting for, and after a long, back and forth fight, Aurai cut the being down. The desert exploded with light, and suddenly Aurai was awake on Ossus holding the crystal in his hand. The whispers he had heard before that had piqued his curiousity were still there, however now he could understand them as his soul spoke back to the crystal, which had turned from cloudy to a bright sapphire, along with his eyes, showing that his body and the lightsaber were at one with each other.
Aurai had no recollection of how much time had passed, assuming that each time he entered the trance, a day he would awaken the following morning. When he checked the chrono on board the ship Exitialis let him borrow, he had spent weeks inside the crystal, his body preserved only by the Force. It was confirmed by his stomach being unable to handle much food when Aurai finally tried to eat on the way back to Korriban with the crystal and the artifact.
Before he set down on Korriban to see his Master for the first time in many weeks, Aurai replaced the red crystal in his lightsaber with his new sapphire crystal. The lightsaber came to life in the Force for Aurai, having been made whole. The Force sealed the lightsaber, fusing it with all that Aurai was and all he stood for. Exitialis didn't seem to notice the change in Aurai's lightsaber colors when his training resumed in the Shii-Cho and Ataru forms.
Aurai settled back into his normal training regimen that encompassed the majority of his life. Though in what little spare time Aurai did have, he started watching other apprentices who were practicing in the open around Korriban. It was his attempt to be social, something he started working at since the day he killed Yal.
The Truth
19 – 22
Things came to a head in Aurai's life soon after he had turned nineteen. Having focused his entire being on combat, dabbling in the Force only to learn certain aspects that every Dark Jedi should know, and to learn to better augment his body when fighting, Aurai had grown stronger than he had ever hoped. Aurai wasn't the only one to realize this, however, and Exitialis began sending him on more frequent missions. The retrieval missions became assassinations, and the locations that had once been almost at random were now focused on Bastion. Aurai could sense that Exitialis was up to something, but he couldn't figure it out.
The first assassination was a short, fat human by the name of Bon Domiv. The man dressed in the finest attire Aurai had ever seen. Just the man's socks alone looked as if they were more expensive than the torn, black robes that Aurai had worn for the majority of his apprenticehood. Bon was the first of the assassinations, and he was also the easiest. Aurai ignited his lightsaber into Bon's back, letting the beam of light pierce out of his chest, directly through his heart.
The second assassination, a man by the name of Dree Kalson, was more difficult. For one, the man who was in his mid twenties was a Force user. He had sensed Aurai coming and prepared himself. Aurai's swordsmanship gave him the kill, though, and Dree. Aurai hadn't even primed the engines on his ship for launch when Exitialis gave him his next target: Treyer Jo'Mang.
Treyer knew Aurai was coming though, and he let Aurai know just how he knew. The two men Aurai had assassinated previously had worked for Treyer. When his other subordinates had found them both dead, Treyer decided to call all of his people to surround him. There was no way Aurai could get to Treyer without going through at least ten other people who were armed with various vibroswords and blasters. Not a single one survived Aurai's onslought.
Aurai thoroughly enjoyed training, but he was enjoying himself even more without it. He treated every mission as a test of his skills and to improve on them. He would exercise every morning he could, and practice what he had learned in the last nineteen years every night he could. It was a 'trial by fire' training, Aurai figured.
Aurai ended up staying on Bastion for over a year, assassinating target after target simply because his Master said to. He didn't think about where he was, or who he was killing. After killing Yal, death seemed so natural to Aurai, so he felt nothing as he slaughtered each target given to him. He began thinking there was no reason behind the assassinations other than to eventually find someone who could kill Aurai and rid Exitialis of his presence.
Aurai was twenty and on the verge of mastering the Shii-Cho form while expanding his knowledge and ability with the Ataru form. He had had the chance to become sociable while on Bastion and away from the constant monitoring from his Master, though his sociable skill was abysmal. More and more, Aurai thought of ignoring Exitialis' hails and slipping away to blend in with the populace of Bastion. The thought was short lived, as Exitialis gave him one final target.
As soon as his Master told him that his next target was Kadamar, Aurai knew there was a plan in place that Exitialis hadn't told Aurai. He couldn't figure out why he was killing his old slaver. Maybe Exitialis thought Aurai would get pleasure out of revenge? Maybe it was a way of truly killing Aurai's old life. Regardless of the reason, Aurai put all thoughts to the back of his head and confronted Kadamar in his self-proclaimed fortress.
The fight was harder than Aurai could have ever imagined, and it lasted longer than any fight he had had previously. Aurai was about to finish Kadamar off for good when Exitialis walked in and stopped Aurai. Aurai let his Master at the fallen Dark Jedi, only to find out the Exitialis didn't plan on killing the man right off. Exitialis started telling Kadamar a story of a young man who was carrying out some business with a Dark Jedi. The young man was a Dark Jedi as well, but didn't want to attract any ill attention toward himself, so he hid his presence and conducted his business accordingly. Except during the business trip, the young man met a woman and despite himself, fell in love with that woman. They conceived a child, though the young man didn't stay to see the birth. The pregnant woman, whom the Dark Jedi owned, was allowed to have the child, but brutally murdered there after. The young man didn't know if his child had been born or not, but he had sworn revenge against that Dark Jedi. It was a merciful act of the Force that brought the young man's child to him, several years later, though the boy was on the verge of death.
Aurai was crying, realizing near the end of the story what the story was. Having the story of own life played back to him made him realize just how tragic his life actually was, and the fact that the only family he had left had turned out to be the only person who was truly in his current life. The story was over, and Exitialis motioned for Aurai to finish the man off. Aurai beheaded Kadamar, tears stinging his eyes. Exitialis exited without another word. In fact, Aurai didn't hear from Lord Exitialis again for a couple years, despite Aurai's trying to hail him.
During those years, Aurai researched the documents in Kadamar's fortress. He learned about his mother, what secret dealings Kadamar was doing, and even techniques he was training his apprentices in. The men Aurai had assassinated were Kadamar's financial, security, and slaver pillars. After Aurai had killed them, Kadamar was tumbling down even if Aurai hadn't killed him.
Aurai continued practicing the Shii-Cho form, perfecting the style at long last by the age of twenty-two. He had seen an increase in opponents with blasters during his assassinations, and decided to take some teachings from the lightsaber technique holocrons in Kadamar's fortress. He began studying the Shien form. By the time Exitialis finally made contact by coming to Aurai in Kadamar's fortress, Aurai had a basic understanding of the fundamentals of the new form, and could apply those basic skills as needed.
Exitialis, Aurai's father, had come to Aurai knowing that he had turned twenty-two. It was the age of knighthood. Exitialis told Aurai that, and told him that he had every intention of knighting Aurai that day. Aurai felt his heart skip a beat when Exitialis said that Aurai's last test was to kill his Master. It was the final step in killing what was left of his old life, and Exitialis wanted to meet Aurai's mother again. There was no fight, as Aurai was expecting. Exitialis feigned an attack only to drop his lightsaber once Aurai thrust his own. Aurai watched in horror as his Master, his father, fell to his knees with Aurai's sapphire blade piercing through his midsection.
Aurai's tears were no surprise to Exitialis, who wiped them away in an act of compassion not for his apprentice, but for his son. His father faded in his arms, whispering a few last words that Aurai would take to his own grave. Aurai mourned for only a moment more before steeling himself with the cold resolve he had been trained to have. He was a Marauder.
RP Sample:
The march was finally over! Just a few hundred more feet and they were done! Most of the slaves had tears streaming down their cheeks and involuntarily began speeding up as their minds enclosed around the thought of the death march finally coming to an end. Alex sauntered forward with his head hung. His eyes were swollen, puffy and red, though his light brown hair hid them like a veil. His lips were cracked, sporting deep gouges like the canyons and ravines of Korriban. Where the others showed happiness, Alex kept his head hung, unable to hide the hole that had formed in his heart when Kelli, the care giver that had been a mother to him, had died seven days prior.
Shouts and gasps of relief and praise came from ahead in the line of slaves. Alex looked up, hazel eyes fixing on two tall figures carved out of the rock face. The two figures formed a gate, through which the slaves were being marched through. They were being unshackled on the other side of the gateway. Alex hung his head again, letting his hair hide his eyes once more as he staggered through the gateway. Large, rough hands pulled Alex and unlocked the shackles on his wrists. He watched them fall to the orange dirt as the same rough hands pushed him toward the rest of the slaves who were still walking up the valley.
Men and women in uniforms and robes alike were working in the valley. They cut away at rocks, held gatherings around ornate carvings in the rock, and there even a few walking around with eyes wondering from being to being as if suspicious of their nature. Alex couldn't even fathom the amount of time it took to build the valley, with all the tall figures and pillars, each more ornate and older than the last.
Something pressed on Alex's back with such force that it knocked him down, effectively ripping him out of his silent wonder. He heard laughing from behind him; laughter that was joined by several others. Alex rolled onto his back, lifting his hands in surrender. There was a boy, much older and bigger than him, standing menacingly above him. Two others who were smaller than the big boy, but still bigger than Alex, stood behind him on either flank. They smiled and laughed. Alex hoped they'd accept his surr..Crack!
Alex rolled over with the force of the punch against his cheek. He whimpered, just loud enough so that only he could hear. The boy struck him again. One of the other boys kicked him. Alex found himself curling up into a ball automatically, tucking his head in his arms as his body naturally melted into the fetal position. They kept hitting and kicking him without any end.
“What a pathetic little worm!” the smallest boy mused. All three laughed. It felt like their hits and kicks were stronger when they laughed. Alex wanted to cry but could only manage a whimper.
“He doesn't even fight back!” the biggest one added.
Please help me... Alex wanted to yell it, he wanted to scream, but he had lost his voice. His body had no fluids left to cry. Why are they doing this? What did I do to them?” He started to see spots and his ears began to roar as the beating got worse. They're going to kill me... They're going to kill me... The thought did Alex no justice when he was already in the fetal position. What little pride he may have had by surviving the death march faded, his will to live left his body with the blood that was splattering around him with each strike. They had broken skin now, and Alex was already feeling light headed from the blood loss and dehydration.
Kelli... help me... All hope faded from Alex's being as he gave in to the beating. He lifted his head, readying himself for the crushing blow to his five year old neck that would finally end him. Instead, he found himself staring at a shiny object. It was curved, and as ornate as the structures littering the valley. Alex recognized the object, not from memory, but for what it was: a knife. A star flared to life in his heart, shining only through his eyes as he left the comfort of the fetal position and began crawling, slowly, agonizingly toward the dagger.
The boys attacking him had no idea the object was there. They practically let Alex pick it up. It was the biggest boy's turn to hit him. Alex spun around at the last moment, thrusting the dagger up with both hands as hard as he could. The boy's downward inertia was his downfall. The blade punched through the boy's stomach. He grunted, his eyes widening in shock and pain. Alex rolled over, letting the dagger free itself as the boy fell to the orange dirt, his own blood now pouring from his wound. The other two boys stood still, at a loss for words for what they just witnessed. Alex staggered to his feet, legs and arms shaking wildly.
“What?” the smallest asked, unable to break his confusion.
“He was an acolyte, you scum!” screamed, rage turning his face red. Alex lifted the dagger so that it was between the two boys and himself. “You're nothing but a filthy slave! How dare you touch him!” He came at Alex, blindly and wild with rage. The boy punched Alex, but proceeded to mark himself for death as well as he ran straight into the blade.
Alex staggered back with the punch, giving the smallest initiate time to come plan an attack and come at him. The boy hoped to catch Alex off guard, but had timed the attack too late. Alex saw the boy coming from his peripheral vision. He swung the dagger wildly at the boy, and the boy ran into it like the others. The gash in the boy's neck spurt blood in streams as he fell to the orange dirt.
Silence overwhelmed the three corpses, and Alex stared at them, still holding the dagger as if they might jump up and attack him again. He whimpered, knowing that they wouldn't. They couldn't. He had killed them; they were dead. Alex felt his knees turn to jello and he fell to them in a heap. His whimper wasn't more than a whisper, but it was all he could manage.
He stayed like that for what seemed like hours, though it was only minutes. Foot steps came to his ears, snapping him out of a whimpering, internal state he had forced himself into. Alex didn't look up as the foot steps stopped in front of him and the booted feet they belonged to were in his vision.
“Get up, boy,” a firm, scratchy voice commanded. Alex ignored it. The same voice sighed deeply, and suddenly Alex found himself squirming in the air, unable to touch the ground. He stared at the man holding him up without even touching him. The man wore a black cloak with black armored robes underneath. He looked clean and neat, as if he had never sweat or felt dirt in his life. As the man lowered his hand, Alex's body descended too until his feet touched the ground softly. Alex stayed standing, despite his shaking legs.
“Do you know who I am, boy?” the man asked, tilting his head as if genuinely curios. Alex shook his head slowly, breathing out what could have been a 'no.' “I am Exitialis. You're holding my dagger- rather tightly I might add.” Alex looked down to find the he'd naturally put the dagger between Exitialis and himself. He lowered it slowly, causing Exitialis to chuckle lightly. “What is your name, boy?”
”A-A-le-lex,” Alex said, his voice barely a whisper. Some how, the man heard him and shook his head.
”Alex, is it? That's not a good name,” Exitialis said. He stepped forward, placing a hand on Alex's head. His expression was one of deep thought until it lightened, as if a light had been turned on in his mind. ”From now on, you will be known as Aurai.”
”A-Au-rai,” the boy stammered, unsure of what the man was getting at.
”I watched you from the moment you neared the gateway,” Exitialis said. ”I watched when those acolytes attacked you, and I watched as you killed them with the dagger that I had placed there to test what you were made of. You did well, and as a reward, I will apprentice you. I will teach you the ways of the Dark Side of the Force.” Alex was too tired and drained to try and fight the Sith's agenda.
The Force? Dark Side. I'm going to be a Dark Jedi...
”You're name is now Aurai, apprentice of Exitialis. You're old life is dead and gone. Only your new life matters, and it is in my hands. Do you understand, Aurai?” Exitialis asked, knowing that the boy would nod his head in agreement. As if Aurai even had a choice.
Name: Aurai Exitialis
Race: Human
Age: 22
Height: 5'8”
Weight: 160lbs
Appearance:
(Image Originally by Keiii)
Aurai has calming, almost angelic features. With no blemishes, dark side corruption, or anything else the Sith generally have marring their faces and bodies, Aurai can sometimes be mistaken for a simple civilian, depending on what he's wearing. His eyes are the same sapphire of his lightsaber blade and can seem to glow from time to time depending on how one looks at them. He keeps his light brown hair at shoulder length.
Personality
Aurai seems like a very calm, collected, and even apathetic person. He walks slow and deliberately as if he doesn't have a care in the galaxy. He rarely shows emotion, which gives an almost fear inducing ability to seem apathetic towards everything. It is all a trained cover that those who get to know Aurai would find out and be able to sense. Therein lies the problem, Aurai isn't very sociable.
Though coming a long way since his birth, Aurai is still by no means a sociable person. He keeps to himself mostly, and when talking with others he is quiet and doesn't have much to say aside from a need-to-know basis. Standing up to the largest of oppenents with ten times his strength is easy for Aurai to charge head-long into, but put him in a room by himself with another person, especially a girl, and he gets nervous.
Most people are at their element when they are deceiving, or bartering, or even teaching. Aurai is in his element when he's in combat. He loves the art of killing with a blade, and knows all too well that it is a love that will eventually kill him. The young man is afraid of girls, but fears nothing of death.
Birth place:Ravelin, Bastion
Faction: Dark Jedi
Rank: Marauder
Lightsaber: Single Blade (Single Phase)
Color: Sapphire
Practiced Lightsaber forms:
Shii-Cho 5
Ataru 3
Shien / Djem So 1
>>Sub-form Backhanded
Force-Sensitive Abilities or practices:
Telekinetic: 4
Telepathic: 3
Body: 7
Sense: 5
Protection: 1
Healing: 0
Destruction: 1
Specialized Skills:
Attributes:
Physical Strength: 6
Intelligence: 5
Speed: 7
Leadership: 1
Unarmed: 5
Melee Weapons: 6
Ranged Weapons: 1
Bio:
The Birth
1 – 4
Jessika knew better than to to love, yet she did so anyway. She met a young man by the name of Vance. He captivated her imagination with stories of the star beyond Bastion, and the frightening things he had done. It didn't take long for Jessika to fall for Vance, and when she did, she fell hard. Normally it wouldn't have been a problem, but Jessika was a slave to a Dark Jedi know as Kadamar. The relationship she had with Vance, who was simply a spacer doing business with Jessika's master, was forbidden to her. It didn't stop her from giving Vance everything she had left to give, which he took with promises of returning again someday. Jessika had his child, whom she named Alex. Vance never returned, and Jessika faced the wrath of her master.
Alex was given to another slave woman after the Dark Jedi killed Jessika for defying his laws. The woman in charge of raising Alex into a life of servitude was named Kelli. For all Alex knew, Kelli was his mother, having been asleep and too young to have any memory of his real mother. The more he grew and became conscious of what was happening around him, the more Kadamar hated him. Alex helped Kelli with her duties as a chef for the Sith Lord, and tried to keep out of trouble as much as possible, though it had a way of finding him. Kadamar would tell the boy everyday that was simply a replacement; that was entire role in life.
A Savior
5-7
When Alex was five years old his Lord traveled to Korriban with Alex and the rest of the slaves. They were shackled and marched in a line to the starport, where they were crammed into a small shuttle that would travel separate from the Kadamar's grand vessel, and then marched single file again once on Korriban. The whole experience took five agonizing days, and when they had finally landed on Korriban, nearly a quarter of the slaves were ill.
Alex soon realized the the easy part was behind him when his Lord forced the slave to march to the Valley of the Dark Lords. The journey would take two weeks. The slaves weren't fed, they weren't bathed, and they weren't cared for. Alex couldn't help but feel relieved that every time one of the slaves dropped out of the line, it at least wasn't him. He just stayed close to Kelli for what little protection and comfort she could provide.
Her providing anything to the young boy was short lived on the forced march. Only seven days into it, Kelli suffered a heat stroke and died. Alex tried to wake her up, tears in his eyes, but was pushed forward by the guards. He was forced to leave the woman he thought to be his mother in the dirt, where she wouldn't rest in peace, but rather become food for the creatures tailing the line of slaves like vultures. Alex was devastated; he cried and whimpered until his voice gave out and he had nothing left to cry out.
Finally, after a two week journey of death where nearly a third of the slaves died, they reached the Valley of the Dark Lords. They entered through a small ravine that acted as a funnel for anyone or thing entering or exiting; it made the life of the troopers on the other side guarding the passage way easier. Alex followed the rest of the slaves up toward the Valley itself where they would be put to work, until an acolyte shoved Alex to the ground. Two of the acolyte's friends joined him and they surrounded Alex.
They beat Alex with their fists and kicked him as he curled up in a ball. Alex couldn't call for help, and he couldn't cry because his body had no more fluids left to cry. When Alex about to give up, he saw a curved dagger laying, unnoticed by the acolytes beating him. He crawled, slowly, and painfully to it, picked it up, and stabbed one of the acolytes. The other two stood, stunned by what they witnessed as Alex was finally able to get to his feet and hold the dagger between the acolytes and himself.
The two remaining acolytes attacked Alex again, and Alex killed them both with the dagger. He had acted on instinct for survival, and as he looked at the destruction he wrought, he fell to his knees and whimpered. It was then that a Dark Jedi by the name of Exitialis came to Alex. He explained that he had placed the dagger there to see what the boy was capable of, and having seen Alex in action, was going to take Alex as an apprentice. Exitialis renamed the boy, calling him Aurai, saying that the boy's old life was dead and that he needed a name fitting of a Dark Jedi.
Despite Aurai's young age, his training started immediately. Ordered to keep the curved dagger, Aurai began learning the disciplines of the Dark Side. He was the only apprentice to Exitialis, so he was able to take in all the Dark Jedi had to give him rather than compete with some of the older apprentices. Aurai was small and weak in comparison to the others he would see around Korriban, but it wouldn't be long.
As soon as Aurai was able to channel the Force through him, at the young age of six, Exitialis began the boy's training in combat. His training in combat began as soon as his "classes" were finished with some of Exitialis' fellow Dark Jedi. Exitialis had Aurai practicing stances at first, and then simple punches and kicks. By the time Aurai had turned seven, a year after starting the combative training, he had learned opened palm strikes, knife hands, elbows and knees, and was learning grappling and joint manipulation. The boy was still very young and impressionable, and he had made just as much progress learning about the Force as he had in his hand to hand training.
Aurai never forgot where he came from, as he sparred against slave boys his age and little bit older. He pushed the memories of Kelli to the back of his mind and focused on learning as much as he could. Even at that young age, Aurai knew that he had been given an incredibly lucky break from the way his life had been. Exitialis rarely ever spoke to Aurai unless it was for training purposes, so the day he sat Aurai down to talk was a very rare chance.
Exitialis explained a lot of things about life as a Dark Jedi and how difficult it would be for Aurai. He told Aurai that it was his life's meaning to make sure Aurai was ready for what was to come, whatever that may be, and that when Aurai was older, Exitialis would send him on missions that would test everything Aurai was as a being.
Aurai asked why Lord Exitialis had saved him from the three acolytes. Exitialis patted the boy on the head with a smile, and told him that when Aurai could figure such things out on his own, then he would no longer need a Master. With that, Aurai entered a new chapter in his training, both on the combat and Force fronts.
You Are But A Blade
8 - 12
Aurai's hand to hand combat started encompassing the dagger more and more, though the focus of Exitialis' training switched to actual swordsmanship. Instead of a training saber, like most apprentices would get, Exitialis gave Aurai a vibrosword. Exitialis told Aurai the reasoning behind it; a training saber is light in weight and killing power. Aurai would become stronger while using a real, heavy blade, a blade that could protect Aurai given the dangerous surroundings of Korriban.
The first lessons were how to hold the sword. Being only eight years old, Aurai had to hold the sword with both hands just to keep it from touching the ground. Once Aurai understood how to hold the hilt correctly, Exitialis set him about his first lesson: consistency and discipline. Aurai would stand facing a large pillar and make overhead, two handed strikes on the pillar while stepping forward and backward, taking turns with which foot would be lead.
By the time Aurai was ten years old, he could hold the vibrosword with one hand and manipulate in many different directions but was still focusing on sparring the dull, stone pillar in front of him. This is where, though he became stronger and more disciplined, his Force abilities began to rise more than his swordsmanship, or so it seemed.
Aurai was able to manipulate the Force in small ways now. He could sense things beyond his body, like what people were feeling and their emotions, but it was still unreliable at best. He could lift objects and move them around at will, though he couldn't hold them for very long or control them as he could with a blade. Aurai had only started learning how to manipulate the Force within his own body to give himself added energy, strength, and speed.
At the age of ten, Aurai's mind was maturing faster than a normal boy's thanks to the Force and his training. He began to grasp the concepts around the core Force powers that all Force users knew, regardless of what side they were on. Everyday he would train in the Force until the other Dark Jedi grew tired of his questions, and when he returned to Exitialis after those classes, he would spend hours upon hours in front of the stone pillar and sparring against the slave children to keep up with his hand to hand.
By the age of twelve, Aurai was comfortable enough with the Force that he could use it on a day to day basis without really needing to think about it. He had grown fascinated by the way the Force could augment his body. He would begin swinging his vibrosword at the stone pillar to begin that night's combat training with his Master, and after a while he would begin to use the Force to augment certain muscles and tendons to see the effect it would have on the pillar. It was during this experimentation phase that Aurai fell in love with the combat side of the Dark Side. When Aurai told Exitialis that he didn't care about the advanced Force powers and that he wanted to learn how to fight like a Marauder, Exitialis was pleased.
Thy Bidding
12 – 16
As soon as Aurai had told his Master that he wanted to focus on combat rather than the Force, his training intensified beyond anything he had imagined. His mornings were filled with exercises meant to exhaust him, forcing him to draw on the Force for the added strength, speed, and endurance it gave. Instead of sparring with slave children in hand to hand, Aurai was pit up against other apprentices who were allowed to use their training sabers. His swordsmanship consisted of the same, simple direction based, two handed strikes as before. At noon, after a meal that would be on par with slave rations, Aurai would pick up a training saber, only to simulate the weight of a real lightsaber, and Exitialis began teaching him Shii-Cho.
Aurai picked up the fundamentals of Shii-Cho very quickly, having already been introduced to most of them with his training with the vibrosword. Lord Exitialis was right in the beginning when he had given Aurai the sword rather than a training saber. Between the exercise and the constant training with a heavy blade, Aurai was fast with a training saber. His movements were blurs to some, even without the Force to augment him.
Exitialis had told Aurai that he would be tested via missions that Exitialis would send him on. He got was given his first mission at the age of fourteen. It would be the mission that would determine whether or not Aurai would be given permission to construct his own lightsaber. It was a live or die, mission, meaning that if Aurai succeeded, he lived, if not, he died.
Aurai found himself walking down into the Valley of the Dark Lords. His mission was to find an apprentice by the name of Yal Drogul who was busy trying to find an artifact for his own master, Kadamar. What Exitialis had against Aurai's former slaver, he didn't know, but it no longer mattered to Aurai. All thoughts of Kelli and the slave life he had left behind, he looked in the dearest of hindsight; it was a chapter in his life that was gone and would never return while he was still breathing.
Armed with his vibrosword, curved dagger, and the Force, Aurai made his way to the tomb of Tulak Horde. It was there, in the middle of a crumbling chamber, that Aurai found Yal Drogul. The apprentice was larger than him by two feet, and more muscular than Aurai could ever hope to be. Yal was chipping pieces of the stone away with his lightsaber. The crimson blade caught Aurai's attention more than the artifact that Yal was trying to cut out of the chamber's center pillar did. It was a death sentence for Aurai to confront Yal, and Aurai figured that Exitialis knew it as well. Aurai wouldn't go down without a fight, though, and he planned on taking at least half of Yal with him.
Yal sensed Aurai's entrance and turned to face the younger apprentice. The older apprentice shot insults and goads from his tongue. Aurai hadn't learned to be very social, especially with those he was fighting, so he stayed silent. Giving up on the insults and trying to goad Aurai into making the first move, something Aurai knew would end him if he tried, Yal charged and the fight began.
What Yal had in strength, Aurai had in speed. Aurai had been trained enough to be able to see strikes and where they would land or pass based on his own movements. Enough spars and trained him to be patient, though too much could mean a drawn out fight, which drew much more attention. Aurai dodged and parried Yal's attacks, while Yal simply blocked Aurai's. The heavy set of the vibrosword hindered Aurai from being faster than Yal could compensate for, which gave the monster of a young man the advantage over Aurai, who couldn't rely on strength at all.
The fight lasted longer than Aurai was expecting. Finally, Yal's endurance faltered, and Aurai seized the opportunity, driving his vibrosword through the older apprentice's neck. Aurai watched Yal fall and choke on his own blood until he was dead. He watched the light in the young man's eyes fade, and with it, so too did the light in his own eyes. His features became apathetic for a moment until something made him have the uncontrollable urge to laugh. Aurai stood above the body of his victom, laughing hysterically with tears streaming down his cheeks. Laughing so hard felt amazing to Aurai, who had rarely even smiled in his life. His uncontrollable spurt of laughter changed his life forever.
It was several hours after Yal had fallen when Aurai returned to Exitialis with Yal's lightsaber and the artifact he was excavating. Aurai kept the fact that he had buried the older apprentices body to himself, guarding it with walls that even his Master couldn't penetrate. Exitialis was pleased with Aurai's work, though Aurai had quite a few bruises and scratches from the fight. His Master gave Aurai a day to recover, and then gave him his next assignment: to obtain his lightsaber.
Aurai focused on the words of his Master; he was to “obtain” his lightsaber. He didn't need to make it, or to find it, but to obtain it. Yal's lightsaber would have done, if he didn't care that the blade and hilt weren't a direct reflection of himself. Exitialis had said that the lightsaber is an extension of one's arms, and Aurai didn't like the idea of someone else's arm attached to his. He made his decision: Aurai would make his own.
The first step, was gathering the materials needed. Aurai spent weeks scavenging through the tombs of old Dark Lords finding all of the pieces he would need. The only thing he needed after that, was a crystal. Due to the lack of color variety, Aurai was forced to use the synthetic, red crystal from Yal's lightsaber. Aurai laid all the pieces out on the floor in front of him and meditated on them with the Force, something he had never practiced before.
The hilt began to click into place as Aurai projected himself into the lightsaber. The pieces that he had picked up in many different shades and colors, turned black, while the highlights of the tightening rings of the lens and the pummel turned silver. The tukata hide strips he had acquired wrapped around the hilt, fusing itself with the hilt. The dark brown of the leather turned to a crimson as the Force heated and cooled the objects, fluctuating between Aurai's moods as he walked through his entire life up to that point. When Aurai opened his eyes, it was two days later and his lightsaber lay in his hands. Despite having completed the task of obtaining a lightsaber, Aurai wasn't happy with it. Every part, color, and chip was a part of him, except the crystal, which was a hole that he could never fill no matter how much he tried.
With the construction of his lightsaber, Aurai picked up where he left off in lightsaber training. Lord Exitialis had had time to gauge his apprentice over the years, making the ultimate decision to teach Aurai the Ataru form. Aurai's days were filled, morning to night, with training once again. Aurai would be awake and exercising before the Korriban first rays of sun breached the night sky. Due to dwindling rations, Aurai had trained himself to subdue hunger with the Force, but he ate when he would scarf a quick breakfast down everyday after his morning exercises. The first half of the day was spent revisiting the Shii-Cho form. The later half of the day was spent learning the Ataru form.
Aurai was thoroughly excited to be learning the Ataru form. It fit the young apprentice like a glove. By the age of sixteen, Aurai had learned the fundamentals of the Ataru form and could use the form with increasing ease and ability.
Battle of Sapphire
16 – 18
As Aurai matured, Exitialis trusted him with more and more. By the age of sixteen, Exitialis trusted his apprentice with off-world missions. It started with little missions here and there to retrieve small bits of information or to do Exitialis' bidding with a client of his. The most notable, however, was a mission that ended up lasting several weeks.
Exitialis sent Aurai to the planet Ossus. The mission was to recover yet another artifact for his Master, though when Aurai finally stepped on the planet of Ossus, he knew it would harder to find the artifact than he first thought. What would have normally been a routine mission, soon became an expedition to find the artifact his Master wanted.
It took the young apprentice two weeks to find the artifact, and with it, he found a strange, cloudy crystal. He could hear whispers in the Force coming from the crystal, but kept shrugging the feeling off. Finally, Aurai's curiosity got the better of him, and before he left Ossus, he started meditating on the crystal.
The crystal took him to a place within himself. A desert stretched on for what seemed like miles in every direction and was completely walled in by impassable mountains. A man who looked to be in his mid-twenties, though his features were hidden under black robes, crimson armor, and a cloth mask that covered the lower half of his face. The man asked why Aurai had come to his layer. After a long, ineffectual conversation, Aurai awakened from his trance to find that whole hours had passed. His curiosity wasn't cured, and he meditated on the cloudy crystal again.
During the second visit with the being living within the crystal, the being asked Aurai what it was that he fought for. Why had Aurai survived up until now. When Aurai couldn't answer the question, the being attacked. Aurai fought the being to a stand still, though it took more out of him than he would have liked to admit. He woke up the next morning with no recollection of ever falling asleep, and immediately went back into the crystal to confront the being.
On the third attempt, the desert, which had started changing since the second trance, was covered with rolling hills and buildings. The being screamed at Aurai, accusing him of corrupting the being's layer. Aurai took a new approach to the being, and commanded that he bend to his will. The being attacked, and again the two fought to a stand still. Again Aurai woke up the next morning, and having had enough to the being within the crystal, once more entered the trance.
The desert had become a city with ships flying out into the atmosphere. The mountains that formed the walls around the city were lit up and began displaying architectural designs. The being appeared again. Aurai demanded that it bend to his will. The being refused to unless Aurai could fully tame it. Aurai attacked this time. Where the previous two encounters had come up inconclusive, this time Aurai knew exactly what he was fighting for, and after a long, back and forth fight, Aurai cut the being down. The desert exploded with light, and suddenly Aurai was awake on Ossus holding the crystal in his hand. The whispers he had heard before that had piqued his curiousity were still there, however now he could understand them as his soul spoke back to the crystal, which had turned from cloudy to a bright sapphire, along with his eyes, showing that his body and the lightsaber were at one with each other.
Aurai had no recollection of how much time had passed, assuming that each time he entered the trance, a day he would awaken the following morning. When he checked the chrono on board the ship Exitialis let him borrow, he had spent weeks inside the crystal, his body preserved only by the Force. It was confirmed by his stomach being unable to handle much food when Aurai finally tried to eat on the way back to Korriban with the crystal and the artifact.
Before he set down on Korriban to see his Master for the first time in many weeks, Aurai replaced the red crystal in his lightsaber with his new sapphire crystal. The lightsaber came to life in the Force for Aurai, having been made whole. The Force sealed the lightsaber, fusing it with all that Aurai was and all he stood for. Exitialis didn't seem to notice the change in Aurai's lightsaber colors when his training resumed in the Shii-Cho and Ataru forms.
Aurai settled back into his normal training regimen that encompassed the majority of his life. Though in what little spare time Aurai did have, he started watching other apprentices who were practicing in the open around Korriban. It was his attempt to be social, something he started working at since the day he killed Yal.
The Truth
19 – 22
Things came to a head in Aurai's life soon after he had turned nineteen. Having focused his entire being on combat, dabbling in the Force only to learn certain aspects that every Dark Jedi should know, and to learn to better augment his body when fighting, Aurai had grown stronger than he had ever hoped. Aurai wasn't the only one to realize this, however, and Exitialis began sending him on more frequent missions. The retrieval missions became assassinations, and the locations that had once been almost at random were now focused on Bastion. Aurai could sense that Exitialis was up to something, but he couldn't figure it out.
The first assassination was a short, fat human by the name of Bon Domiv. The man dressed in the finest attire Aurai had ever seen. Just the man's socks alone looked as if they were more expensive than the torn, black robes that Aurai had worn for the majority of his apprenticehood. Bon was the first of the assassinations, and he was also the easiest. Aurai ignited his lightsaber into Bon's back, letting the beam of light pierce out of his chest, directly through his heart.
The second assassination, a man by the name of Dree Kalson, was more difficult. For one, the man who was in his mid twenties was a Force user. He had sensed Aurai coming and prepared himself. Aurai's swordsmanship gave him the kill, though, and Dree. Aurai hadn't even primed the engines on his ship for launch when Exitialis gave him his next target: Treyer Jo'Mang.
Treyer knew Aurai was coming though, and he let Aurai know just how he knew. The two men Aurai had assassinated previously had worked for Treyer. When his other subordinates had found them both dead, Treyer decided to call all of his people to surround him. There was no way Aurai could get to Treyer without going through at least ten other people who were armed with various vibroswords and blasters. Not a single one survived Aurai's onslought.
Aurai thoroughly enjoyed training, but he was enjoying himself even more without it. He treated every mission as a test of his skills and to improve on them. He would exercise every morning he could, and practice what he had learned in the last nineteen years every night he could. It was a 'trial by fire' training, Aurai figured.
Aurai ended up staying on Bastion for over a year, assassinating target after target simply because his Master said to. He didn't think about where he was, or who he was killing. After killing Yal, death seemed so natural to Aurai, so he felt nothing as he slaughtered each target given to him. He began thinking there was no reason behind the assassinations other than to eventually find someone who could kill Aurai and rid Exitialis of his presence.
Aurai was twenty and on the verge of mastering the Shii-Cho form while expanding his knowledge and ability with the Ataru form. He had had the chance to become sociable while on Bastion and away from the constant monitoring from his Master, though his sociable skill was abysmal. More and more, Aurai thought of ignoring Exitialis' hails and slipping away to blend in with the populace of Bastion. The thought was short lived, as Exitialis gave him one final target.
As soon as his Master told him that his next target was Kadamar, Aurai knew there was a plan in place that Exitialis hadn't told Aurai. He couldn't figure out why he was killing his old slaver. Maybe Exitialis thought Aurai would get pleasure out of revenge? Maybe it was a way of truly killing Aurai's old life. Regardless of the reason, Aurai put all thoughts to the back of his head and confronted Kadamar in his self-proclaimed fortress.
The fight was harder than Aurai could have ever imagined, and it lasted longer than any fight he had had previously. Aurai was about to finish Kadamar off for good when Exitialis walked in and stopped Aurai. Aurai let his Master at the fallen Dark Jedi, only to find out the Exitialis didn't plan on killing the man right off. Exitialis started telling Kadamar a story of a young man who was carrying out some business with a Dark Jedi. The young man was a Dark Jedi as well, but didn't want to attract any ill attention toward himself, so he hid his presence and conducted his business accordingly. Except during the business trip, the young man met a woman and despite himself, fell in love with that woman. They conceived a child, though the young man didn't stay to see the birth. The pregnant woman, whom the Dark Jedi owned, was allowed to have the child, but brutally murdered there after. The young man didn't know if his child had been born or not, but he had sworn revenge against that Dark Jedi. It was a merciful act of the Force that brought the young man's child to him, several years later, though the boy was on the verge of death.
Aurai was crying, realizing near the end of the story what the story was. Having the story of own life played back to him made him realize just how tragic his life actually was, and the fact that the only family he had left had turned out to be the only person who was truly in his current life. The story was over, and Exitialis motioned for Aurai to finish the man off. Aurai beheaded Kadamar, tears stinging his eyes. Exitialis exited without another word. In fact, Aurai didn't hear from Lord Exitialis again for a couple years, despite Aurai's trying to hail him.
During those years, Aurai researched the documents in Kadamar's fortress. He learned about his mother, what secret dealings Kadamar was doing, and even techniques he was training his apprentices in. The men Aurai had assassinated were Kadamar's financial, security, and slaver pillars. After Aurai had killed them, Kadamar was tumbling down even if Aurai hadn't killed him.
Aurai continued practicing the Shii-Cho form, perfecting the style at long last by the age of twenty-two. He had seen an increase in opponents with blasters during his assassinations, and decided to take some teachings from the lightsaber technique holocrons in Kadamar's fortress. He began studying the Shien form. By the time Exitialis finally made contact by coming to Aurai in Kadamar's fortress, Aurai had a basic understanding of the fundamentals of the new form, and could apply those basic skills as needed.
Exitialis, Aurai's father, had come to Aurai knowing that he had turned twenty-two. It was the age of knighthood. Exitialis told Aurai that, and told him that he had every intention of knighting Aurai that day. Aurai felt his heart skip a beat when Exitialis said that Aurai's last test was to kill his Master. It was the final step in killing what was left of his old life, and Exitialis wanted to meet Aurai's mother again. There was no fight, as Aurai was expecting. Exitialis feigned an attack only to drop his lightsaber once Aurai thrust his own. Aurai watched in horror as his Master, his father, fell to his knees with Aurai's sapphire blade piercing through his midsection.
Aurai's tears were no surprise to Exitialis, who wiped them away in an act of compassion not for his apprentice, but for his son. His father faded in his arms, whispering a few last words that Aurai would take to his own grave. Aurai mourned for only a moment more before steeling himself with the cold resolve he had been trained to have. He was a Marauder.
RP Sample:
The march was finally over! Just a few hundred more feet and they were done! Most of the slaves had tears streaming down their cheeks and involuntarily began speeding up as their minds enclosed around the thought of the death march finally coming to an end. Alex sauntered forward with his head hung. His eyes were swollen, puffy and red, though his light brown hair hid them like a veil. His lips were cracked, sporting deep gouges like the canyons and ravines of Korriban. Where the others showed happiness, Alex kept his head hung, unable to hide the hole that had formed in his heart when Kelli, the care giver that had been a mother to him, had died seven days prior.
Shouts and gasps of relief and praise came from ahead in the line of slaves. Alex looked up, hazel eyes fixing on two tall figures carved out of the rock face. The two figures formed a gate, through which the slaves were being marched through. They were being unshackled on the other side of the gateway. Alex hung his head again, letting his hair hide his eyes once more as he staggered through the gateway. Large, rough hands pulled Alex and unlocked the shackles on his wrists. He watched them fall to the orange dirt as the same rough hands pushed him toward the rest of the slaves who were still walking up the valley.
Men and women in uniforms and robes alike were working in the valley. They cut away at rocks, held gatherings around ornate carvings in the rock, and there even a few walking around with eyes wondering from being to being as if suspicious of their nature. Alex couldn't even fathom the amount of time it took to build the valley, with all the tall figures and pillars, each more ornate and older than the last.
Something pressed on Alex's back with such force that it knocked him down, effectively ripping him out of his silent wonder. He heard laughing from behind him; laughter that was joined by several others. Alex rolled onto his back, lifting his hands in surrender. There was a boy, much older and bigger than him, standing menacingly above him. Two others who were smaller than the big boy, but still bigger than Alex, stood behind him on either flank. They smiled and laughed. Alex hoped they'd accept his surr..Crack!
Alex rolled over with the force of the punch against his cheek. He whimpered, just loud enough so that only he could hear. The boy struck him again. One of the other boys kicked him. Alex found himself curling up into a ball automatically, tucking his head in his arms as his body naturally melted into the fetal position. They kept hitting and kicking him without any end.
“What a pathetic little worm!” the smallest boy mused. All three laughed. It felt like their hits and kicks were stronger when they laughed. Alex wanted to cry but could only manage a whimper.
“He doesn't even fight back!” the biggest one added.
Please help me... Alex wanted to yell it, he wanted to scream, but he had lost his voice. His body had no fluids left to cry. Why are they doing this? What did I do to them?” He started to see spots and his ears began to roar as the beating got worse. They're going to kill me... They're going to kill me... The thought did Alex no justice when he was already in the fetal position. What little pride he may have had by surviving the death march faded, his will to live left his body with the blood that was splattering around him with each strike. They had broken skin now, and Alex was already feeling light headed from the blood loss and dehydration.
Kelli... help me... All hope faded from Alex's being as he gave in to the beating. He lifted his head, readying himself for the crushing blow to his five year old neck that would finally end him. Instead, he found himself staring at a shiny object. It was curved, and as ornate as the structures littering the valley. Alex recognized the object, not from memory, but for what it was: a knife. A star flared to life in his heart, shining only through his eyes as he left the comfort of the fetal position and began crawling, slowly, agonizingly toward the dagger.
The boys attacking him had no idea the object was there. They practically let Alex pick it up. It was the biggest boy's turn to hit him. Alex spun around at the last moment, thrusting the dagger up with both hands as hard as he could. The boy's downward inertia was his downfall. The blade punched through the boy's stomach. He grunted, his eyes widening in shock and pain. Alex rolled over, letting the dagger free itself as the boy fell to the orange dirt, his own blood now pouring from his wound. The other two boys stood still, at a loss for words for what they just witnessed. Alex staggered to his feet, legs and arms shaking wildly.
“What?” the smallest asked, unable to break his confusion.
“He was an acolyte, you scum!” screamed, rage turning his face red. Alex lifted the dagger so that it was between the two boys and himself. “You're nothing but a filthy slave! How dare you touch him!” He came at Alex, blindly and wild with rage. The boy punched Alex, but proceeded to mark himself for death as well as he ran straight into the blade.
Alex staggered back with the punch, giving the smallest initiate time to come plan an attack and come at him. The boy hoped to catch Alex off guard, but had timed the attack too late. Alex saw the boy coming from his peripheral vision. He swung the dagger wildly at the boy, and the boy ran into it like the others. The gash in the boy's neck spurt blood in streams as he fell to the orange dirt.
Silence overwhelmed the three corpses, and Alex stared at them, still holding the dagger as if they might jump up and attack him again. He whimpered, knowing that they wouldn't. They couldn't. He had killed them; they were dead. Alex felt his knees turn to jello and he fell to them in a heap. His whimper wasn't more than a whisper, but it was all he could manage.
He stayed like that for what seemed like hours, though it was only minutes. Foot steps came to his ears, snapping him out of a whimpering, internal state he had forced himself into. Alex didn't look up as the foot steps stopped in front of him and the booted feet they belonged to were in his vision.
“Get up, boy,” a firm, scratchy voice commanded. Alex ignored it. The same voice sighed deeply, and suddenly Alex found himself squirming in the air, unable to touch the ground. He stared at the man holding him up without even touching him. The man wore a black cloak with black armored robes underneath. He looked clean and neat, as if he had never sweat or felt dirt in his life. As the man lowered his hand, Alex's body descended too until his feet touched the ground softly. Alex stayed standing, despite his shaking legs.
“Do you know who I am, boy?” the man asked, tilting his head as if genuinely curios. Alex shook his head slowly, breathing out what could have been a 'no.' “I am Exitialis. You're holding my dagger- rather tightly I might add.” Alex looked down to find the he'd naturally put the dagger between Exitialis and himself. He lowered it slowly, causing Exitialis to chuckle lightly. “What is your name, boy?”
”A-A-le-lex,” Alex said, his voice barely a whisper. Some how, the man heard him and shook his head.
”Alex, is it? That's not a good name,” Exitialis said. He stepped forward, placing a hand on Alex's head. His expression was one of deep thought until it lightened, as if a light had been turned on in his mind. ”From now on, you will be known as Aurai.”
”A-Au-rai,” the boy stammered, unsure of what the man was getting at.
”I watched you from the moment you neared the gateway,” Exitialis said. ”I watched when those acolytes attacked you, and I watched as you killed them with the dagger that I had placed there to test what you were made of. You did well, and as a reward, I will apprentice you. I will teach you the ways of the Dark Side of the Force.” Alex was too tired and drained to try and fight the Sith's agenda.
The Force? Dark Side. I'm going to be a Dark Jedi...
”You're name is now Aurai, apprentice of Exitialis. You're old life is dead and gone. Only your new life matters, and it is in my hands. Do you understand, Aurai?” Exitialis asked, knowing that the boy would nod his head in agreement. As if Aurai even had a choice.
