Trigger warning: Violence, Gore, Eaten Alive
"Therefore, you have to die."
Before I could speak, a low rumble built into a harsh growl, and Khem shoved himself away from the wall where he had stood unnoticed and started forward towards us. The dashade reached casually up and yanked his massive greatsword free from the magnetic holster on his back, turning the blade to more fully demonstrate how terrifyingly long and broad it was. He held it easily in one large hand, blocking the only exit. The apprentices in front of me spun comically, lightsabers dropping into their hands as they were confronted by the sight of my companion towering over them.
"Um, Ortosin? Is that a dashade?" One of them looked about to wet himself. The main apprentice shoved him forward, towards Khem.
"Maybe this isn't such a good idea!" the second babbled, igniting his lightsaber.
"Khem, what is it you do to force users again?" I spoke in Basic so that my enemies would be sure to understand. "Consume them and spit out their bones?" I was very unsettled when Khem bared his fangs at me in the facsimile of a grin.
"Let me show you," he growled.
Khem lunged forward with blurring speed, grabbing the nearest attacker by the straps of his armor in one enormous clawed fist and smashing him into one of his friends while simultaneously bringing his sword down in a crushing overhead strike upon Ortosin. Although the sith apprentice managed to catch it on his lightsaber, the power of the blow knocked the man's weapon completely out of his grasp. The lightsaber tumbled to the floor, catching Ortosin on his arm and bracer as he fell backwards from the impact. He yelled in pain, but it was overshadowed by the cries of fear from his other companions.
Khem's speed frightened me, too. I'd never seen him move so quickly before, and I unconsciously flinched away. He grinned wider at me, lifting his captive off the ground by the straps of the durasteel breastplate he wore. The man choked and gagged as it dug into his throat. He clutched at the deshade's scaly skin, trying to find enough purchase to pull himself up or release the armor. Khem flung the man down to the ground and stomped on his leg. The sharp crack of his shinbone breaking was almost drowned out by the victim's agonized shriek. I couldn't help cringing away.
Ortosin had recovered enough to call his lightsaber back to his hand, and he tried to go head-to-head with Khem. That was a mistake. The dashade snapped his broadsword up to catch his opponent's lightsaber on the cortosis weave, and the momentum of the heavy weapon shoved the apprentice backwards again. The human tried to strike again, and again, and again, but each failed to connect as Khem used his weapon to almost casually bat the blows to the side.
The final apprentice had finally recovered his balance and summoned lightning, choosing to stay back and try to attack Khem from a distance. The bright white energy leapt across the chamber, engulfing the dashade in a shower of sparks. For an instant I thought I was going to have to join the fight, or flee, or something. Then Khem laughed, he actually laughed. I saw that the dashade had ducked his head to catch the lightning on his shoulder instead. Khem's tattoos and jeweled implants had previously always seemed decorative to me, but now I realized that as the lightning struck him, it gathered around the red gems, causing them to glow as the energy dispersed down along his skin and into the ground instead of penetrating deeper into his body.
With vicious precision, the next time Ortosin swung at his side, he angled his weapon to slide down the lightsaber blade instead of just catching the strike. In one easy movement, he cleaved through the hilt of the lightsaber and through the man's fingers. My Cathar hearing picked out the sound of them hitting the floor, one by one. The dashade smashed his forehead into the human's face, and the man crumpled, dazed.
That left the last apprentice, who was still sending every shred of lightning he could summon at the monster, not that it was doing any good. Khem held my gaze as he left Ortosin bleeding and shaking on the floor and strode menacingly over to the man, who was sobbing now, babbling and pleading for his life. The dashade stood before his opponent, savoring the man's terror and enjoying his demonstration that my best weapon was useless against him.
"And now I feast!" he exulted.
Khem Val grabbed the standing man by the wrist, ignoring the lightning streaming from his fingertips, and shoved the entire hand in his mouth. I closed my eyes, but that didn't save me from hearing the ripping of flesh and the screaming reaching a new pitch as Khem tore the appendage entirely free of its arm and used his teeth to crack the bones inside. The smell of blood and bile and waste was growing stronger. Ortosin vomited, and at least one of the three had soiled themselves during the fight.
The first man was trying desperately to crawl out of the chamber, but Khem would have none of it. The dashade strode over and kicked him down, setting one enormous clawed foot on the apprentice's back. He savored the way the screams of his victims echoed around the oddly asymmetrical chamber.
"Someday I will be free of my oath," said Khem Val in the language of my people, staring directly at me. "On that day, you shall not be able to escape me." As Ortosin lay shaking in a pool of his own blood, fingers, and vomit, as one of Darth Skotia's apprentices cried and cowered beneath his foot, and as the final man began to weaken from blood loss, Khem Val resumed his feast.
I thought about running, about leaving, but the dashade had positioned himself directly in front of the exit, so instead I covered my ears and turned away; but it didn't help. The first man died quickly; the second, much less so. When I chanced a quick glance over at the carnage, I realized that Khem had begun eating the second man by tearing off chunks of his face, and I had to swallow hard to keep from vomiting myself.
The dark side around us was tumultuous now, and it felt like the screams and agony were echoing through the Force itself, cascading and reflecting off of the disjointed facets of the chamber, compounding until the darkness filled my bones. It was when Ortosin began to be consumed that I realized a change had come over the obelisk. The blood of Khem's first two victims had pooled around the base of the carved stone, since it sat at the lowest point of the floor. Where before it had been a dull brown, now it shone with an inner light. It snapped me from my horror and gave me a purpose. Whatever Khem might threaten, for now, he was bound to me. He wasn't going to hurt me before his oath ran out, and I would flee or kill him or have him executed before he would do that to me. He was trying to terrify me, and I was ashamed by how I had cowered away.
"Hold, Khem," I said. He stared at me, blood and viscera dripping from his fangs and down his chest, and grabbed a fistful of intestines, ripping them free of the body in his hand. He stuffed one end in his mouth and slurped. I gagged, but his gruesome display suddenly seemed childish, reminding me of some of the slaves I'd grown up with, the ones that enjoyed tormenting those weaker or younger or smaller, than they were. That, combined with the whirling dark side around us, gave me the courage I needed.
"Enough, Monster," I snapped at him. "You've made your point. Bring him over here and put the blood on the obelisk." Khem delayed for another long second, and I felt a tendril of fear threaten to break my resolve. Would he break his vow? I could taste his fury and hatred in the Force.
"I serve. For now," he added, as he grudgingly brought Ortosin to me and set the body on top of the obelisk, letting it become drenched with the blood welling from the unconscious man's abdomen. The obelisk grew brighter, and from it, one by one the inscriptions in the stone walls began to slowly glow in my force sight. I set my holopad to record and dashed around the room, indicating the order in which the carvings were to be read. When the entire room was aglow in pulsing force energy, I felt the Dark Side drawing me closer to the obelisk. It seemed concentrated at the base, so I lifted with all of my strength in the Force. It rose a few inches, revealing a metal tablet underneath. I smiled in triumph as I pulled it free.
"Success," I said. "I couldn't have done it without you." He scowled at me.
"You may have bound my will, little sith, but our bond will be broken, and make no mistake, I will devour you."
"By the time we are done, you will have fed to excess," I said. I thought it a rather clever retort, myself. Khem Val eyed me for a long time.
"My hunger is never slated, and you are no Tulak Hord," he said finally. "But I will serve you faithfully until I am free."