#cyresk

AIFENN

The Hero of Tython (Jedi Knight). Present during the sacking of Courascant as a padawan. Pardon my candle analogy, but this Miraluka will burn himself at both ends just to keep others warm (threat, promise.) He genuinely believes that there is a spark of good inside everyone. When discomfited, he defaults to being very polite... Underneath all of that, he does have a sense of humor, he tends to banter with his enemies if he knows them well enough. He believes strongly in not letting his emotions control him, although he does FEEL them. Like a good jedi, he tries to release his emotions into the force, or at the very least not let them effect his judgement in the field... He is not always successful. He is a dutiful commander with a gentle side he isn’t often allowed to indulge. Belives wholeheartedly in the Jedi and the good they are trying to do. Has attached himself as something of a guard to Sh'Iloh, which helps fill the void his padawan-brother Fenley left when he defected. Yes he IS attached, but he's quite hard on himself, so he thinks that it's the least of his sins. This is what happens when you take a guy who wants to be a temple guard and protect people but ends up being really good at dueling and killing because he has trauma related to being an overachiever (thanks, Fenley...)

Additionally, he has an RE-1 scout droid that serves as an assitive droid for him, as he cannot see holograms. It’s an excitable little thing that can often be found scuttling up and down his armor, or bouncing along behind him. It is a chipper and curious little fella. 

SH'ILOH

The Jedi Sage (Consular). An emotionally distant Jedi seer with an intense and powerful connection to the force – the cosmic force, specifically. This leaves them physically weak and often strains their body. Hear me out: being a ceaseless conduit for the will of the force takes a toll. The force loves them and it SUCKS. Have you tried to pour a waterfalls worth of water through a straw? That’s how Sh'Iloh feels all the time. It is frankly exhausting. It also lets off a sort of invisible signal to others: people consistently report their hair standing on end, and a pervasive feeling of being watched while in Sh'Iloh’s vicinity. 

Their force visions work like this: They can see the branching paths that lead to different futures – most clearly for turning points involving them. This can be something huge or just what the different choices at breakfast will lead their day to be like. It’s on 24-7. They often experience a feeling of deja-vu, and feel disconnected from the present, meaning they make logical and emotionless strategic decisions. It’s always a surprise to them when people show they genuinley care or hold strong feelings for them. Always trying to shift the future down the path that will most greatly benefit the most people. Is somewhat disillusioned with the Jedi order, but prefers it to whatever experiments the Sith would undoubtedly subject them to.

DUSTROS

Darth Vindictus (Sith Inquisitor) is an ex-slave that clawed his way up the ranks to become a Darth. He is surprisingly tolerant of those whose company he enjoys, has a dark sense of humor, and keeps careful tabs on both his friends and his enemies for reasons he prefers to let people sweat over. He also holds a vicious grudge and he ALWAYS gets even. Lobbies against slavery on the council for largely socio-political-economic reasons, so he doesn’t have to get into his feelings about having been a slave. He carefully considers his choices before making decisions, except in the case that one of his options is to kill a slaver, in which he will do it every time he has the opportunity. He has loads of unresolved issues and he’s not going to go to therapy about them, ever. Fun fact: He and Fenley fake dated when both of their positions were more precarious in the Empire to distract from their individual secret workings and it was hilarious. 

CYRESK

Cipher Six (Imperial agent) is a Chiss who used to be a member of Csilla's Secret Police before being reassigned to work as a spy for the Chiss’s Imperial Allies as a Cipher agent. Before being sent to the Empire, he volunteered to have his memories erased so that he could not be caught as a double agent. He deeply resents his past self for this, but you'll never get him to admit it. As he hardly remembered his old self, it's only fair that he build his new self off of the bones of the memories he has left and various habits and personality traits from covers on his missions. For example, he decided to always see his targets off with a smile. It's only polite, after all!

His personality is smiling and playful by default. He likes interesting and contradictory things and people, and he enjoys pressing people's buttons to see what sort of reactions he'll get. He dislikes being honest with people about himself, because he sees that as handing over information that can be used against him. He carries out his jobs flawlessly in order to get away with various shenanagins on his missions and so that Keeper stays off his back. He blames his best missions on Cipher 9 to avoid drawing the attention of the Dark Council - which works for a time, but not forever. He's eventually scooped up by Darth Vindictus to serve as his left hand – both gathering information and tying up loose ends. 

CILVOE

A smuggler with Republic sympathies, a deep dislike of Chiss and it’s class system, and the owner of a very fast starship. He often pretends to be Pantoran in Republic space and hides his eyes just because it’s easier than explaining he is a Chiss – and safer, because he does not want the Ascendancy to come after his ass for helping out the enemy of their allies. Often smuggles stolen medical supplies and weapons, but has a fondness for plants. Acts first, thinks later, and tends to find himself in situations he could not begin to imagine being in. Sometimes he feels that his life is a comedy and he’s wearing a jester’s hat. 

Additionally, he is very cute and a complete lightweight, which has often led to dancers at cantinas doting on him and treating him like a little brother figure. He tries to come off as competent and serious, if not a little intimidating, and it almost always backfires on him. His cuteness cannot be contained and I will not let anyone overlook it so it's game over for him. 

LACHLANN CARID

Lachlann of clan and house Carid, Mandalorian bounty hunter and all around problem solver. They come from a traditional clan that prizes honor, and so they act strictly in accordance with Mandalorian values and the Resol'nare: Education and armor, self-defense, our language, our leader - all help us survive. As a Cathar foundling, they do acknowledge that being Mandalorian after the Mandalorian's destroyed their planet and most of the population is... Complex. But it is what it is.

post procedure cyresk would literally wake up every single morning and have no idea who or where he was. he'd blink back to conciousness multiple times a day to just. scattered snippets. blink. hes buckling his boot. blink. hes looking out a window. blink. he's eating something. his body didn't remember how to MAKE memories. they had to wait for that much at least before sending him off to imperial space. you're a double agent for us, you're going to be a spy for someone else, you went through this procedure," etc. etc. just endlessly because he kept forgetting.

when he DID finally start retaining memories they sent him off, but at that point hes still deeply confused. yeah he knows how to take care of his living breathing body and he knows what his mission is but. who the hell is he? he's just a blank space. a chiss stuffed with cotton. they told him he has skills but he doesn't know them. he doesn't know anything about himself, what he likes, what he dislikes, who he was, who he might want to be...

its just space. empty, vague space that he doesn't know how to feel.

his memory continues to get better, but keeper for SURE had to reintroduce himself every single time they met for at least the first week because Cyresk couldn't remember his desgination. or his own designation. he doesn't even remember most of his own name best he's got is a core name.

i imagine intelligence training was eye opening for him. blasters feel wrong (chiss use a different type) but he instinctively breathes and relaxed and can shoot a target from so far away he's shunted into a special track for snipers. he knows how to pry secrets out of people, how to read their vulnerabilties, how to find what they hide, how to get close enough to slip a knife between someone's ribs.

and he just knows things. pieces that his former self left behind. he can tell what brand of death stick someone is smoking from the smell. he knows exactly where major veins and nerve clusters are. the first time he saw a dead body, he wanted to figure out how they died and why -- the smell didn't even bother him, and that's not a normal response, he's since been told. his eye catches on random passerby and he finds himself following people for blocks at a time without realizing. somehow, he's never been noticed.

it's only when he starts going on jobs that he starts to figure out a personality. namely, that he doesn't have one. he can blend in, but he can't belong. that's the whole point of playing pretend. so he starts with little things. he takes habits like he's stealing them, trying them on and discarding them if he doesn't like them. he starts to watch how people move, how they dress, how they cut their hair. some people smoke. it seems familiar, so cyresk takes that up.

and when he's allowed that. well. he starts aiming bigger. actively trying to put himself together as a person, picking traits he likes. the smiling came from a mission he was on where he had to smile a lot... he was told it was polite, that he had a nice smile, that people would rather see a smile than a frown... an elderly woman even said she was lucky to see such a handsome smile before she went. (went where? he doesn't know.) so now he smiles on missions when he kills people because, well, it's only polite to make their last moments a little more bearable, right?

OK SO. it starts like this:

same as the imperial agenty storyline, fake defection, ardun kothe uses the restraints to keep cyresk/six from betraying the republic, hurting his team, telling anyone else about the code, etc.

cyresk, naturally, is not okie dokie about this. but hes also not entirely surprised that the empire did this to him, because he does not actually work for the empire. he works for csilla. classic chiss "i sure wish the empire hadn't found csilla" moment. but he is ALSO the guy who volunteered to be mindwiped to infiltrate the empire, so at least this isn't his first rodeo. if you held him at gunpoint and forced him to be honest, getting his memory messed with was WAY easier, so this is worse. like, way worse. he doesn't know what he's missing from before, that was a different person to him. the keyword happens TO him and he gets vertigo and nosebleed and blacks out if he his thoughts veer too close to breaking his orders.

he is pretty freaked out, but rather than break his restraints, his priority is to turn them to his advantage. if he has to be helpless, he's going to weaponize it in any way he can. it means losing and losing and losing more to these bastards, but he can avoid ardun kothe and in the meantime make a plan.

and his plan is this: get friends. get them fast.

beause he's just a defector, and he doesn't even LIKE the empire. he'll say so under the restraints and everything, because it's the truth. he is genuinely upset about the restraints and had no idea they existed. these are truths. he does not like telling the truth (he HATES being honest, but this type of honesty where he has no say in the matter is the worst he's ever experienced) but it's going to have to be his weapon, because ardun fucking kothe can ask him if he lies, and he will have to answer honestly.

so, truths AND friends. fine.

he befriends the strike team. and he has to try to play it as honestly as he can, because again, he can't lie here. this sucks for him. he likes lying and hes very good at it, but he sticks to basic truths: the empire controlled him without his knowledge, they wanted to use him like a puppet, they wanted to take his free will. republic outlaws slavery, therefore, they wont do that to him. (except that they are doing that to him.)

he tries to fit in. he tries to be genuine. it comes off stilted and he can honestly say its because he's been mindwiped before. he doesn't remember who he was, and this new version of him post-csilla is still.. learning. growing. becoming a person. that's an easy idea for the republic to swallow. suitably sympathetic. guy who woke up and didn't have a choice, didn't know what he was getting into, doesn't know why his past self did this -- its even true.

he gets into a wildly toxic and high stakes game of oneupmanship with hunter that he is constantly losing. he has no power here, and hunter is not shy about using his keyword like a leash. like a rope to strangle him. and he likes to make it seem as if cyresk has done it to himself, which he can't abide. so he loses, and loses, and loses these confrontations over and over again, and he plans.

mission wise, he saves chance, even though he could have killed him for using the codeword. its all about garnering goodwill. guilt. anything that he can use. its about proving he's a person to these people who use his restraints. for all the republic says it doesnt allow slavery, they are allowing this, and they want to keep it quiet. so naturally, he wants to drag it into the light.

he has some odd conversations with wheels about the nature of free will and how its simple to obey orders. he cant mention his restraints outright, but there are things he can do. hunter doesn't get the keyword until hoth, but you know he uses it more than he needs to. for simple things, for stupid things, to piss cyresk off, to see the light leave his eyes. cyresk kisses him to shut him up sometimes, and hunter uses the keyword to make cyresk kiss him, but that's the extent of things there. cyresk is at this point an interesting and idle fascination, someone to bat around and see what happens -- but he's leashed. collared. and that takes some of hunters interest away because no matter what, in the end, cyresk is going to lose. and he does, always, consistently, because hunter makes sure of it. and of course, he's not allowed to talk about those moments.

so if he's seen commisesrating with wheels, wheels may ask, how do you know what its like to be a droid? i'm not allowed to discuss it. just repeats that phrase every time something about the restraints would come up. wheels remarks that its odd to saber, and we're off to the races. hunter wont bring it up. kothe thinks theres no other choice. wheels may not know its wrong. but saber? chance? they may go to bat for him, especially after he saves chance's life.

saber, at least, seems completely blind to what the restraints can be used for. the potential for abuse. how dark things could get. it wouldn't take much to kick off, depending on how well he ingratiated himself, because the squad KNOWS about his restraints. they all have the keyword in case of emergency.

he'll take his shot as soon as he can. kiss hunter in the hallway, of his own free will for once, and not just to shut hunter up and stop him from using his keyword. make sure it happens in front of saber. she congratulates him later, asks if he and hunter are dating. and his answer?

i'm not allowed to discuss it.

im just saying, it would set off my alarm bells. i would wager it sets off saber's, too. trying to get him to answer just results in more of the same. it looks bad. really bad. so she calls in kothe. tells him something is wrong. tells him she think the restraints were used... unethically. off mission. that she found cyresk kissing hunter and he can't talk about it.

this leads to kothe using the code and cyresk being trapped in his own head again, but this time, this ONE time, its what he wants. its according to plan. he can't lie like this, not even if he wanted to. so when he's asked if hunter has abused his keyword? yes. has hunter taken advantage of him? yes. has hunter kissed him without his consent? yes. he can't lie. and worst: does he have proof?

yes. yes he does.

and he slides a little recording device out of his pocket and over to kothe. because as soon as he realized this was the play he was going to have to make, he decided to record himself at base. its a small device, and he has never taken it off world, but its enough. it has proof of hunter using the codeword as often as he pleases. it has an incident of hunter using the codeword to make him kiss him -- although not the incident that saber saw, because he orchestrated that himself.

and kothe is tired. so tired. he's an ex-jedi, he already felt these restraints were necessary but horrible. hes using them anyways though, and now this makes it a more immediate dilemma. they cant take the key phrase back. hunter has it. the squad has it. cyresk is compromised.

only, that's not going to be true for long. some questioning forces cyresk to admit that he took the IX serum. and its either going to work or kill him very, very soon. he will be unbrainwashable or his brain is going to melt out of his ears. and he thought this was NECESSARY. that the REPUBLIC drove him to this, not the empire. and i think that would realllllly hurt ardun kothe, and the rest of the team. you know chance is drowning in guilt after cyresk saved him.

(in my canon, i suppose, I want to say that the IX serum has a chance of working, or a chance of outright killing you. it takes between 3 and 30 days to rewire your brain, and once its done, if you live, you would need to invent an entirely new kind of mental conditioning because the new way your brain works prevents it from working.)

anyways the team gets THIS information too and of COURSE if you dont want this to be true, you pull in hunter. to defend himself. and he of course is like well fuck. i may have just been made. tries to get cyresk to admit to setting him up with the keyword and it backfires. because cyresk is. well. hes banned from honeypot missions for a REASON.

something along the lines of he finds hunter thrilling because he makes him so afraid. like being chased through the woods by a murderer. he hates hunter for it but his wires are crossed and he also wants to simultaneously kiss and kill him.

which is obviously not the answer hunter wants. and not at all the answer the others want.

and at this point serum IX kicks in because this is my story and i love the dramatic timing of hunter trying to salvage the situation and it escalates because cyresk just collapses bleeding from the nose and eyes. like thats bad. not supposed to happen.

when he DOES wake up hes in the hosptial. at night. hunter is there. and hes MUCH more interested now than he was before. because he never really, truly expected the cipher agent to be able to turn this situation around on him. never thought his cover with the republic would be compromised. so hunter isnt really actually interested until cyresk throws off the mind control and destroys his cover, getting an upper hand he NEVER should have been able to get, at which point its like. nuclear level toxic yaoi. they would make each other worse.

cyresk trying to kill hunter for revenge with varying levels of success and vice versa and they do kiss about it. but also they are trying to stab each other. it is what it is. its unhinged and its not going in the mission reports. enemies to worse enemies type of relationship. great banter but its all one-upping each other until one of them gets shot for sure.