Does it begin here?
Black rain, gray mud, red shadows.
The flames reach like fingers to the sky. The heat feels like a promise although he could not tell you of what. The corpses are everywhere, slumped in piles, scattered like toys with the most broken and beautiful at his shoulder, waiting for more orders just as black as he is. There is thunder in his heart and satisfaction in his brain and the bone-deep twist in his gut of knowing that finally, finally there's no going back. That there are no words in this universe or any other that will ever, could ever make this right.
It feels good. He's always been torn. Ruptured. Barely holding together but this… this feels good.
He steps forward and his saber throbs, spitting sparks like blood.
Does it begin here?
Black walls, gray restraints, white cloth.
She spits defiance and fear in equal measure at his face and he's been here so many times before that he would close his eyes if he could, variations on this theme nearly beyond count. He'll break her as he's broken all the others but for the moment he's content to crouch at her feet, listening to her heart beat staccato against its cage like a bird believing itself still in flight.
He feels everything, as always. It will end, as always.
Does it begin here?
Red walls, black weapons, gold rage.
There is purpose finally. Clarity even, which is novel enough that he takes a heartbeat to swallow it down, taste it in all its simplicity. Her eyes are wide and afraid and he swallows those down too because all pain instructs. Torment expands all horizons to singularity.
She's on her knees as before he was on his and this, also, feels right. A toy, spinning on its axis, a frantic return over and over again to center. They tremble together on the cusp of the shift and he feels and he bleeds and he does as every one of his teachers believed he was too broken to ever do and he acts.
It ends here.
The sabacc dice melt in his hand like everything else in his life and he stares at emptiness and feels no surprise. His fingers close. The world chooses then to pulse with his hurt, as if for some reason this is a moment that could count and he's caught out of time, out of options. He looks up to find that she is looking down and he's on one knee in the wrack and ruin and this does not feel right, this does not feel right at all.
Black gloves, gray ramp, white pain.
It's not all his. But he feels and he feels and he feels and it's still not enough, could never be enough.
He stands when she is gone and while he has broken everything he could reach both within and without and there is an ocean of salt outside cracked and bleeding like entrails, they are still not dead.
Pain teaches. Torment educates.
He's destroyed two masters now. Maybe this time he can make it stick.