‘twas a special time of year on the planet of Symbol, fortress of the terrible Dacian Palestar. After the volcanic death of the planet, the ruined world gave birth to new and warped seasons, and one of the strangest was upon them.

With the stored up precipitation and burned off atmosphere having reached a critical mass, cold winds and ice swept down to do battle with the lava seas and obsidian plains. For a bizarre few weeks, even the blackened peaks of Dacian’s personal fortress became home to snow and ice.

To the twisted mockery of society that made up the ruling elites of the Palestar Crusade, this marked an unusual social time. Palestar himself, returned from distant lands, had called back his great lieutenants from whence they roamed for a gala event. There, he said, he would share the secrets he had discovered abroad on his long pilgrimage.

The very invitation had left his retainers gobsmacked, as the usually taciturn Dacian had until now shown no interest at all in ceremony. To think that he would declare a holiday of sorts was unimaginable.

That’s not to say that they didn’t come, for although they were incredulous they weren’t stupid. This is how the oft-empty and silent halls of the fortress came to be filled with the sounds of warriors, pirates, cultists, and even fouler beings. On the highest parapets, where Dacian had opened his doors to his best and chosen few, warlords and killers awkwardly rubbed shoulders and skidded bemusedly along on the ice.

And so it was that James Riddley, Dacian’s chief strategist, found himself in the company of the wise and terrifying Sith Dioan Silk.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Mr. Riddley sighed as he looked out across the snow-swept land. “I should feel relieved I guess, this is a refreshing change. Don’t misunderstand me, I like being free from plotting wars, and planning assassinations, and organizing conquests, but somehow I can’t stop looking for the angles Dacian’s going for by calling us here today.”

“James Riddley,” Silk muttered. “You are the only being I have encountered who can take a reprieve from his enslavement and turn it into a problem. Perhaps Dacian is correct. Of all the James Riddleys that share that head of yours, you are the James Riddly-est.”

With that, the two turned their attention inwards towards the spire, which emerged from the parapet and held their mysterious host. Dacian at last emerged, sliding with ease along the ice between his slipping and sliding guests.

The giant Mandalore Kale tried to catch his attention, but could only shuffle slowly along the ice for fear of his huge frame toppling over. Dacian paid him no mind and approached Riddley and Silk instead.

“I do hope you’ve wasted my valuable time for something more pressing than watching a dozen fools slither across your roof,” was Silk’s chilly greeting.

“There is more to come, yes,” Dacian replied, giving a curt nod to the two of them. “For the moment however, I see you are both lingering dangerously on the edge here to stay off the ice. Come and join me further in towards the spire.”

Silk seemed unwilling to move. It dawned on Ridley that for his pride, Silk didn’t want to be seen slipping and falling over the ice in front of the other Crusaders - especially with Dacian walking at ease besides him. “I see no need to slide about. Why not join us instead?”

The short but intensive staring match that then followed cause Ridley to inch away cautiously, but it was no use. When both moved with deliberate intent to cause the other to slip, it was Ridley who caught both their shoulders and toppled off the edge of the parapet.

He had just long enough to scream and look a fool before landing on one of the safety nets about ten feet down. The Crusaders made their unsteady way to the edge in order to look down and laugh, and even Dacian and Silk’s usually humourless faces seemed to smirk with suppressed mirth.

Ridley sighed, as a wedge of snow from a higher parapet dislodged and fell towards him.

Typical.



With nothing but time on their hands, at least until Dacian was prepared to call them together, the Crusader’s high and powerful found interesting ways to amuse themselves about the fortress. This Ridley despised, for apart from Dacian he was the spire’s most frequent occupant and thus suffered the most discomfort.

Emerging from his modest hole in the wall, the first thing he noted was depressing absence. “Not one tribute, not one trophy, not one message,” Ridley murmured to himself as he dug around outside his quarters. “I saw Kale present a string of shrunken Storm Trooper heads to Lazik as tribute for use of his ships in a convoy raid, and what do I get for planning it? Not so much as a thank you.”

Leaving his corner of the fortress, he headed towards the vast common area below Dacian’s personal spire, where the powerful had congregated to wile away the hours. Passing a pirate captain of the Lazik clan as he did so, Ridley tried to stand a little taller and said “You’re quite welcome for that shipment of arms I organized to Threshold last week. Think nothing of the service.”

“That’s fine,” remarked the pirate with a mocking grin. “We don’t. Sold most of the weapons to Onyxian gun-runners for fresh supplies, anyways. I don’t remember thanking you.”

His shoulders hunched and his mood murderous, Ridley slunk away. Nearby he saw that someone had let Targ run free from his enclosure. The madman had brought a huge pile of snow indoors in his knotted hands and used it to start making a snowman in the middle of the walkway.

Ridley approached carefully, lest the bestial Targ flip and try to ravage him. Thankfully he seemed engrossed in his bizarre pursuit, and Ridley was just wondering how simple snow could entertain the murderous beast when a hand fell free out of the snow arm.

This seemed to disappoint Targ, who shoved the stiff limb back into the snow and packed it tightly again. Realizing that Targ was likely playing with the corpse of some unfortunate, Ridley wisely decided to back away.

Bereft of other entertainments, he at last settled to where a few Crusaders took idle pot shots at a remote floating around the room. Lazik, Kale, Maxson, and others blasted freely into the air, trying to hit the tiny target but failing.

Frustrated by the noise of the distraction at last, Silk stormed over and glared at the remote - which burst immediately into bits. The other Crusaders decided to keep any resentment quiet, as the old Sith gave them a dirty look before storming off again.

Ridley realized he would go quite mad or quite dead if he spent much longer in the company of such professional barbarians, and so was relieved when he saw the maiden lingering at the edge of the commotion. Retreating to her company, Ridley gave a nod by way of greeting and took up a place besides Dacian’s blind Force adept.

“There’s no chance you know why Dacian summoned us, is there?” Ridley asked, hoping the tight mental connection between the two had let something slip.

“No,” the maiden flatly replied. The close connection also meant Dacian could rely on her compliance. If he didn’t feel like telling Ridley something, he wouldn’t learn it from her.

Ridley sighed. “This is getting out of hand. I think we’ve got a real problem.”

“What sort of problem?”

“I don’t know, that’s the problem!”

“That you know there is a problem is the start.” The maiden took on a business-like demeanour and stood opposite Ridley, fixing him with her blindfolded eyes. “Is there a traitor? Has someone turned against Dacian?”

“Er, no?”

“What about an enemy attack? Do you suspect some enemy is about to invade, or use this opportunity to try and kill Dacian?”

“No, I don’t think it’s that either.”

“Do you suspect something of Dacian? Do you think he’s an imposter, or under alien influence?”

“Er… maybe that one? No, I don’t think that either.”

The maiden paused a few moments, contemplating other standing orders and tactical scenarios. “Are you just a generally uncertain and doubtful person with nothing of value to contribute at this time?”

“Yeah, that’s probably the one,” Ridley mumbled glumly.

The maiden seemed to process this for a while, and Ridley was once again reminded that there actually wasn’t anything going on up there at all. She was merely shuffling through Dacian’s stored commands and restraints, which he updated regularly to ensure she carried out his will.

At last, she said “There is something you can do to ease your anxiety. Dacian has need of your services - he is preparing to introduce his lieutenants to the secrets he discovered in the depths of space. This meeting could become quite heated and emotional, moreso even than a normal meeting between such powerful and murderous men. If you could… direct the meeting, it might go more smoothly.”

Ridley perked up at this. “Would I get some advance knowledge on what’s going on here? Because that’s what I really want to know.”

“Dacian will be taking you into his confidence to ensure the other lieutenants follow suite with his new plans. You will know everything.”

Excited by the idea, Ridley agreed right then and there. The maiden told him to meet her at the spire turbo lift shortly, before disappearing.

Almost the moment she was gone, Dacian himself appeared. Ignoring Ridley, he walked into the common area and opened a huge metal footlocker stashed under a staircase. Almost immediately everyone recoiled, as the sensation of dread that poured out was palpable. Dacian began to pull all manner of strange objects from within, including texts, crystals, lightsabers, even bones and other objects too unnatural to describe.

Quite quickly the room cleared out, as despite their curiosity none could stomach the sucking, grasping emptiness that seemed to emanate from the objects Dacian pulled out. As he left, Silk stopped next to Ridley and offered a generous explanation.

“This is not entirely unusual for Dacian, when he wants to make a point. Were I ignorant of the truth, I might think it Dacian’s one concession to melodrama - more likely, however, there’s some foul and fascinating purpose at work.”

“Is he… decorating the room?”

“Preparing it,” said Silk, a touch of humour entering his voice as he savoured Ridley’s shock. “Although yes, it’s honestly a lot of decorating to set the mood.”

Feeling no less dread than when he first arrived, Ridley retreated from the room with his tail between his legs, set to meet the Maiden and get away from that horrible place.



By the time Ridley arrived, he realized the others were making their way to the vast audience chamber as well. Ridley was a tad uncertain of what was expected of him, but the maiden was at his side to explain.

“Dacian will need your help to keep order, provide necessary information, as well as persuasive reasoning when the Crusaders inevitably try to wriggle out of some of his new commands. To start with, he needs a few more moments setting up, so try and settle things down.”

Ridley moved quickly to the front of the room, where Dacian had once again appeared. He took one look at Ridley and frowned. “I had hoped the maiden would find someone a little more suited to the role. Very well, just do your best not to destroy the Crusade until I return.”

“You are as ever too kind, my master,” Ridley muttered as Dacian disappeared down a nearby chute. Ridley turned to address the milling Crusader leaders.

“Alright, listen up everyone. Dacian is going to be along in a minute to explain to us what his grand announcement is. It may not be very popular with you all, which is why he’s asked me to assist in directing this gathering.

“That’s why when I ask for silence, there must be silence! When I have information for you it will be immediately available, and so long as things are kept civil and subdued we’ll get though this thing civilly and with a minimum of… unpleasentness.” Direct, forceful, confident. Bound to play well with this crowd.

“Like hell your boys were responsible for the Onyx raid, it was my pilot that got them past security!” Lazik howled into Mandalore’s face. The huge Mandalorian lunged across the table and tackled the fat pirate lord, beginning a fistfight. Elsewhere, Targ had started to gnaw on Maxson’s ceremonial cape, while Maxson himself struggled to free his sidearm to be free of ‘that stupid beast’ once and for all.

Ridley nodded to the maiden, who set out amongst them and started knocking heads. Targ was brought down by a stunning flat-palmed blow, while Maxson’s head was struck against the table. Mandalore Kale went flying across the room and smashed into a metal bulwark as the Force flung him away from Lazik, who struggled to breath as invisible hands closed around his throat.

Silk, however, still refused to take his seat. Standing at the back with a particularly bored expression, he said “I acknowledge only your master as a peer, Ridley, and even he barely commands my voluntary cooperation. What could you possibly say to me to make me follow your pathetic lead?”

“I have a fine reason why you should play along,” said Ridley, even his meagre courage rising. “Whatever it is Dacian wants to introduce, it’s going to be controversial - enough for violence, maybe. If he starts thinking he needs to make an example of someone to keep everyone in order, do you really want to be the odd man out?”

Every eye was on Silk, who realized they were weighing up the possibility of scapegoating him, like the starving survivors of a water raft turning their ravenous attentions on the same crewmate. Deciding to play along for the moment, he settled slowly into his seat.

The Crusaders temporarily cowed, Ridley tried again.

“Right, Dacian’s going to be here soon. In the meantime, let’s at least try to keep things together.”

Just as he said this, the maiden approached and whispered fresh instructions in his ear. “Dacian has need of a material aide for his presentation. Take Silk with you and select a slave from the holding pens, one with a strong Force affinity.”

“Now I am the chaperone for incompetents and incapables?” said Silk, rising from his chair as fast as he’d taken it. “Oh well, come, let’s get this over with.”

“What exactly does he… want the slave for?” asked Ridley, uneasily.

“Purely a demonstration,” the maiden assured, with only the barest trace of assurances in her tone. “Remember, it must be one with a strong Force connection.”

Ridley and Silk stepped into the turbolift and plunged towards the bowels of the fortress.

“I don’t know about this,” Ridley muttered as they descended. “I just don’t know.”

“Afraid of getting your hands dirty directly for a change?” said Silk, baring his teeth in a malicious grin. “Be not afraid, I’m sure Dacian will allow you to turn away when he delivers the final killing blow, and you can rationalize away your part in the proceedings as always.”

Arriving at the lowest levels, the two were blinded briefly by searchlights that scanned through the depths, making sure no slave was attempting escape from their bedrock-buried enclosure. With but a nod to the guards the two were allowed in, passing close to the tightly-packed and pitiful dregs that made up the fortress’s slave population.

“An unusually good crop, this,” remarked Silk, as he waved his hands towards the terrified and wide-eyed men and women. “None of them could make Jedi or Sith, of course, but there’s a trace connection there for your master to use. Take any of them, and I’m sure you’ll do fine.”

Ridley’s normal heartlessness went queasy and uncertain when faced with the direct, actual consequences of his actions. “I don’t normally see their faces,” he mumbled.

Looking desperately about, his eyes rested upon a familiar face - a disgraced former Lazik pirate, made a slave for cowardice in battle. He strode over to where the gaunt man was chained to the wall. “What about him?”

Silk frowned. “Not exactly in keeping with the spirit of the request, this man’s Force presence is barely visible.”

“No one would miss him if he died, though,” Ridley muttered back. “He’s a murderer and rapist, he’d get death on a thousand other worlds.”

“By all means, take him, I’m only here to advise,” said Silk with a dry, smug chuckle. “I will so enjoy the look on Dacian’s face when you fail him, of course.”

Ridley wasn’t listening any more, though, he was unbinding the slave. The man himself was docile and mindless from hard labour, and easy to lead about by his chains. “Let’s get out of here,” said Ridley. His face was ashen with a shame that had become unfamiliar in recent months, but which surged back quickly.

They returned at once to the meeting room where Dacian was at last waiting. If he seemed at all pleased to at last have his ‘material aid’, it didn’t last long as Dacian’s senses swept over him. “I asked for a Force sensitive, not a null.”

“Er… yes…” Ridley muttered, immediately regretting his decision.

“Let us see who the odd man out is now, worm,” Silk muttered as he moved away from Ridley.

“You don’t really need a Force sensitive specifically though, surely,” said Ridley, who began to sweat. “I mean, what is it you have planned? What can’t you do with him that you could do with one of the other slaves? Do you really need to make a demonstration of someone to prove your point?”

“I’m starting to think so, yes,” replied Dacian as he narrowed his eyes on Ridley.

Beginning to feel familiar exasperation setting in, Ridley cried out “Then what is it already? What’s the big mystery?! I can’t stand it any longer, what’s the point of this day? Why have dragged us all out here, damn it?!”

Stunned silence ruled, the Crusaders having never thought the scrawny strategist had it in him. As if on cue, Dacian stepped forwards at last through sudden darkness and into a cone of light.

“I have learned many secrets of the Force on my sojourn, and not all of my revelations are of relevance to any of you. Of those that matter, what you must know is that there is a will at work presently in this galaxy that is greater than I, greater than you, greater than all the Emperors and kings the galaxy has ever known.

“The Force is greater than all of us, and with its power it makes us dance as puppets on a string. I will be subservient to no one, God or Emperor, and so it is that my greatest task for you has been realized - to slay a God, to destroy the Force. Even now as it turns its attention to us, sends its angels and devils in equal measure to destroy us, and foil our plans, I find ways to foil its will. This is not an omnipotent god, its power is dependant on worship and the carrying out of its will.

“There are many willing slaves in this galaxy, shepherds who hear the cry of a celestial chorus or demonic choir and lead the flocks of ignorant sheep in service to this vast and alien will. They are our enemies even as we use the Force ourselves in our armies and struggles, for the Force blows like a trumpet for them when it serves the Force’s aims and yet weakens to a whisper when those unknowable aims are at stake.

“And so you will bring these servants unto me, and from them will I take their souls, so that the Force shall be denied their destinies. It shall be you who carries this message unto the galaxy, that their salvation will come with the death of the Force’s shepherds. And this shall be a sign unto our ascension, a true Crusade against an oppressive celestial host.

“Would only that Ridley had not failed me, and I would have been able to make an example of the first such rituals, the soul-sacrifices that shall herald the coming of the void.”

Stunned once more, and this time horrified to boot, the Crusaders simply stared at their leader. They were men much accustomed to atrocity, and yet even they feared his words. Even Ridley, who had allowed his old feelings to bubble up only recently, could not shield himself with his cold and calculating demeanour. He backed into the turbo lift, slave chain still in hand, and let the doors shut.

He retreated to the common area, with the mindless pirate in tow, letting this new dark development sink in. “Maybe he’ll just take this one…” he desperately lied to himself, as he looked at the slave. “Maybe he just wants to prove his theory, test his hypothesis, he’ll take this one… soul and that’ll be the end of it.”

The common area was decorated wall to wall with artefacts of Dacian’s terrible explorations into the nature of the Force. One tiny, cracked sphere hanging by itself in the middle of the room seemed to radiate force energy (and screams) so loudly that even Ridley could sense its power. “Maybe… maybe if he holds this? Maybe one of these… things will make this offering suitable? Will slake Dacian’s thirst?” He didn’t believe so.

Even so, Ridley pulled the slave over and gestured for him to grab the sphere. Though his brain was broken, he still managed to understand the task put before him and seized the sphere with both hands.

Immediately the slave began to scream and jerk before collapsing into a convulsing pile on the ground. He quivered for a moment more, then fell still.

Horrified, Ridley stood over the slave. “I’ve killed him!” All thoughts driven from his mind, Ridley raced from the common area in a panic towards his room, there to bury himself and never come out.

Dacian descended next into the common area, followed in silence by his cohorts. The insanity of his speech had yet to sink in, and so they too were dazed and confused. They found in that place the slave that Ridley had meant to make an offering of.

“It’s not quite so poor as that,” Dacian muttered, as he examined the unconscious slave. “In fact, perhaps all the better. A chance to show that not just those chosen by the Force can be severed from it entirely.”

“I still doubt your words and would love to see you attempt such blasphemy,” said a mocking Silk from close behind. “Kill the Force, indeed! Laughable! Good thing that Ridley failed you, else you might only waste a good slave on a pointless presentation.”

“Not pointless, no,” said Dacian, as he began to gather his various tools and pieces from around the room. “Just needs a little… modification. It can still be done.”

Unease filled the room once more as Dacian began to work the tomes and material focuses that surrounded him. They glowed and floated about as he summoned power from them, forming a circle of dark light around the comatose body of the slave.

Ridley, drawn by the mounting noise, watched in shock as the common area came alight. A strong vacuum sensation kicked up, centered on the slave’s body that seemed to tug at the minds of everyone assembled. Dacian was unaffected - indeed, he seemed to savour the pain, coaxing it higher.

“That’s quite enough,” Silk snapped, uneasily. He could sense the thin threads of the Force that bound everything together beginning to fray and burn, and the unnatural sensation terrified him.

The slave awoke screaming, but he could not move. The vacuum increased in potency, bringing several mighty men to their knees as they struggled against the pain in their hearts. The maiden screamed endlessly, the Force bindings that held her shattered psyche together rupturing from the stress.

In a horrible, twisted moment something seemed to go *snap* in the air and the man before Dacian came to a shuddering end. The light went out of his eyes in a terribly permanent sense, and something unnatural was felt in the air as a part of him slipped away into the void, there to fade to nothingness.

Panting in horrific triumph over the shell of a man before him, Dacian looked at his wide-eyed followers with a heretofore unknown mania.

“Hark, the bloodied angel sings, glory to your reborn king!”