Pax Sanguis Sicarius: Duabus Partibus

Entry: six hundred twenty-five, supplemental one. Link to previous entry regarding Pax Sanguis Sicarius.

Even as murderous as my life has been to this point, I was not prepared in any way for this. Especially for this. Up till now, every life I had taken had been cold, impersonal, distanced. This was everything that wasn't. 

The heat from the priest's blood was practically visible in my shaken state of mind, the air shimmering with the rage boiling from out of his skin. My skin felt on fire where his blood met my flesh.

Deep breaths..."woo-sa"..."woo-sa".

"Traitor!" he seethed through clenched teeth. His eyes wild, searching, panicked yet filled with hate on a level far beyond human. To be quite honest, it was more than a little disturbing. "After all the good work you've done for Nation, all those you helped convert, all that we tolerated because of your service, you turn on us now?"

I shit you not, he lunged at me and tried to bite me. My all too human instincts made me flinch away. There's something strictly primal when someone lunges at you for a bite, something unsettling that drives you back on a level so deep you can't comprehend it.

It pissed me off.

I'm a Capsuleer, meant for things beyond mere humanity, and it pissed me off so much to be reminded of my "humanity", after all the inhumanity I'd come to encompass since that first day.

Plus, the deranged bastard made me flinch.
 
My anger drove me at that point, and I remember little except an unending feeling of rage. I remember I grabbed the dagger, still embedded in the stone through his arm, and wrenched it. His screams nearly broke my eardrums, piece of shit that he was. I pulled the blade free, and sliced his body apart, slow, dragging, ripping strokes meant for pain and not death.

At some point, his voice broke. I didn't stop, his eyes still screaming for him. I kept going, dragging the knife along his bones, letting him bleed out on the altar, the blood itself collected by a pool at the base of the altar.

At some point past that, exhaustion hit me strong enough to dissipate my rage. His stomach was a mess of pale grey meat covered in red sticky fluid. His legs were mangled beyond recognition, the bones themselves protruding in awkward places through the cuts I'd given him.

The dagger was still clean, however, shining with a red brilliance.

I felt a compulsion, something so wrong that I tried to resist even though I had no choice. I held the dagger high over my head, tipping my head back and opening my mouth wide. Something nudged me inside, and I triggered a catch on the hilt. Something happened...

Blood from the pool swirled into the air lazily, forming a stream towards the point of the dagger, and once established, rushed from the point into my mouth. Blood overflowed from my mouth, into and out of my nostrils.

"Drink his lifeblood, or die," a voice spoke to me, a voice penetrating my mind. Sound had no relevance in this matter.

I swallowed, and the blood in my nostrils cleared. Rust, iron, red fluid, a sickening combination overflowing with power suffused into me after each swallow. I kept swallowing the blood, as fast as I could to make sure I could breathe.

My body tried to throw the blood up, but the blood was having none of it, pushing deeper and deeper into me, penetrating the simple walls of internal organs and merging with my own blood. My heart pounded, more powerful, yet under more stress.

At last the ritual finished. The pool was clear of every drop of blood, the priest's corpse a dried husk crumbling before my eyes.

No one was there to see how shaken I was. I took some time to gather myself before heading to the quarters I'd been assigned.

As I left the temple, a whisper brushed my mind. 

"Revenge has never tasted so sweet, has it, Sanguis Sicarius?"

The only taste I could remember was that of iron and blood.

Computer: terminate recording