Warnings: drugs, depression, sexy times (I’ve never read any of the official Star Wars published accounts of people on glitterstim so that spot may be inaccurate) (also yes I’m a sheltered middle-class person so it’s probably gratuitous anyway)
This is actually the second time I’ve posted this; I had thought it was done, and then I started writing the fourth chapter of this arc and decided it had gone a bit ridiculous. Which bothers me as the whole reason I started writing this fic was because I felt BioWare had gone a bit ridiculous. Everything’s mostly the same in this version except the action scene is swapped out for a better one. If you had the misfortune of reading the previous version, please scrub it from your memory! I apologize for the initial lack of quality. Sometimes you have to write the wrong story before you find the right one, but I shouldn’t have uploaded the wrong one.
And the second posting’s taken so long because January was a month of Mondays, as they say, and I was half dead of stress hahaha. Finally scraped the spoons together to get the revision done. And then proceeded to wait some more until I got my teeth into the last chapter just to make sure I hadn’t screwed it up in a different way. (Fingers crossed that I don’t have to change too much from now!) I’m doing much better but the writing is still slow going.
Action soundtrack is Corpse Party: Chapter 4’s Opening! Also some Indestructible!
Also TODAY I LEARNED that ‘running amok‘ is Malaysian in origin.
Part 27: Her Wounds
Aristheron pulled his longcoat more tightly around himself as he walked briskly through the fog. Murlesson had called him, saying he had something important to talk about, and there was something uncharacteristically vulnerable about how he’d asked that had sent him out into the bleak night immediately, away from strategizing with Janelle, Stroud, and Clay. Vany had asked to come, full of concern as was her warm-hearted way, but he asked her to stay behind. Murlesson usually responded better when conversing one-on-one, even if he was friendly with Vany – as much as he was with anyone.
He could feel the younger man’s Force sense, which was unusual. Normally he could only sense him if they were in the same room together, but now he could feel him halfway across the city. There was something careless about it, and he picked up his pace. This wasn’t right. The boy wasn’t entirely together at the best of times, but this was… worse than that. Murlesson had given him directions, but he didn’t need them now.
He wasn’t very surprised to find himself in a disreputable part of the city near the spaceport, nor that it appeared to be deserted. Even the remaining residents would surely find it uncomfortable to be so near a distressed Sith Lord. The fog hung thick in the air, almost as thick as the uneasy swirls of the Force that drifted restlessly around him, brushing past but not touching his cloak of Shadow. Aristheron stopped under a streetlight. “You wanted to talk?”
Murlesson seemed to materialize out of the dark alley before him, lurching out of the shadows and stopping just before stepping into the light. “I’m dying.” His voice was low and raw, his sense a gaping void of despair. He almost didn’t seem to be there, though Aristheron could see the gleam of his mask in the light and feel the Darkness bleeding from him.
“I know,” Aristheron said gently. This wasn’t the time to be concerned over etiquette.
Heavy silence fell between them.
“Do you want to leave?” Aristheron asked. “Spend what time remains to you in fighting Thanaton?”
“Screw Thanaton. He can do whatever he wants,” Murlesson said. He went on, sounding curious rather than sarcastic. “Do you think he’ll leave off if I tell him I’m dying without his input? …I don’t care. It doesn’t matter. I might as well help you kill Giri while I still have control.”
“You are certain?”
Murlesson sighed and sagged against the wall. “I’m already here. I’m already working on your problem. Whatever webs I’ve cast towards Thanaton are weak and immature. Shut up. I only just acquired the 44th. He needs time to take down, time I don’t have. I don’t know if I have time to take down Giri, even. But at least I know you’ll see it through when I give out. And you can have my underlings of course. You can have everything.”
“There really is nothing that can be done?” Aristheron asked. “I must kill Giri and save Salvara, yet if you asked me to help you overcome obstacles in your quest for a cure, I would surely aid you.” It was a difficult choice, the life of a whole planet or the life of his friend, yet…
“You and your Light,” Murlesson muttered, pulling away as if Aristheron’s compassion physically pained him, yet his sense seemed to reach out for support. “No. There is no cure. It’s killing me too quickly, it’s too late already. Zash has spent weeks searching for one. She wouldn’t hide anything from me after all that work. She has no reason to lie; I protect her, even if she doesn’t deserve it.” He hissed through his teeth. “I would fight if I could! But… I can’t. And I’m tired.”
“Then I am truly sorry. And if there is anything I can do you help you prepare for the end, name it.”
“Just don’t ask me to fight hand-to-hand much anymore,” Murlesson said. “I’m sorry. All your teaching is useless now. -I can protect you in the Force!” As if he worried Aristheron might send him away. “I can still be useful. I destroyed one of his Force connections today, a temple nexus as I thought. I… don’t know if I have the strength to destroy them all before his plan reaches…” He broke off. “I really am useless. I don’t know why Ashara won’t just let me kill myself-”
“Murlesson!” Aristheron cried sharply. “That is no talk for a Lord of the Sith. I did not ask you to work miracles for me, only to fight at my side.”
Murlesson was silent a while. “I should have enough strength for that.”
“That will be enough,” Aristheron said. “Never forget your pride. I would not ask a weakling to fight alongside me. Do not kill yourself out of despair. Every moment is a victory against those who would destroy you. Fight to the very end.”
“I used to think like that,” Murlesson mumbled. “Eke out every moment possible, for death comes for us all sooner or later. But there doesn’t feel like a point to it, when death comes soon no matter how I struggle. I…” He pulled himself together. “Never mind. I’ll be ready to fight when you need me.”
“I will be at your side, my friend, all the way,” Aristheron assured him.
Murlesson nodded, and faded back into the shadows and out of sight.
Murlesson crouched in the corner of his cabin, staring hard at the tiny packet cupped in his hands. It had been given to him by a cultist months ago, and he’d kept it hidden away since he found out what it was. But its temptation had been there ever since his illness, its faint call growing stronger and stronger until now, when he no longer gave a frak about the consequences. A shadowy figure leaned over him and he ignored it. When did you ever care about consequences?
Glitterstim was the most addictive and most euphoric drug in the known galaxy; undoubtedly the cultist who had given it to him was addicted, and chosen to show their devotion by sharing their most precious possession. He had chosen not to waste it by throwing it away, but until his illness it had held no allure for him. He’d seen what it did to others, and he valued a clear mind, especially with the sort of power he had accumulated. He didn’t need to blow a hole in the Viper while going on a bad trip.
But he was dying anyway, so why not dull the pain with something stronger than medication? Why not? Why not… Why not indeed…?
‘Never forget your pride,’ Aristheron had said. But what pride was there left to him? What good did pride do him? Everyone died, and dying ‘well’ meant about as much as dying ‘poorly’, which was to say it meant nothing at all. Not to the dead person, and not to the rest of the galaxy.
You fool! A resentful death will haunt you as surely as we do! Have you learned nothing from our very existence!?
Yes, that was right, what if death were not the blank nothingness he’d always believed it to be? His will had always been incredibly strong; what if he ended up a ghost himself? A ghost bound for eternity to his tormentors – he choked, and lurched, and cried out in emotional agony. Such a fate would be unbearable. How did ghosts commit suicide? He was suddenly glad Ashara had stopped him from killing himself. Existence was a trap, a prison, and he couldn’t escape even through ragequitting. It wasn’t fair! No one said anything about fair… A whine used by the weak who cannot grasp what they want.
There really wasn’t any way to be free, was there? How could you separate paint that had already been mixed? He was stained irrevocably, doomed from the moment he’d tainted himself.
Well, a ‘good’ death was still irrelevant. He still wouldn’t care even if he remembered it afterwards. You may change your mind later, but experience is the wisest teacher, after all… He might as well throw dignity to the wind and die in the gutter like the slave scum he was, it would be easier. But… later. As Aristheron encouraged him. If there was a chance he was going to be a ghost, he would fight to the very end. Ha, that’s more like it. More sport.
With death being pushed back on his to-do list, that still left the glitterstim.
He stared at it.
His brain wasn’t even thinking thoughts anymore, logical or otherwise, he was just staring, unable to decide. Were you not supposed to resist being paralyzed by fear? Fool.
Maybe just a tiny nibble. Why not…-!
And now the room was spinning. And glowing. Maybe he should have done more research on this before-
But he felt- good, and terrible, and everything was moving too slowly, and the lights were too bright – aim carefully, push the light switch with his gift – now it was pitch black and still too bright. He could see the Dark Side around him, enveloping him in a comforting embrace, tantalizing with promises of vengeance and destruction, and yet his eyes burned. What did a fellow have to do to experience existence comfortably? Besides all the hurting parts…?
His stomach was hurting even more than usual, actually, and – where was the – he found the edge of the toilet and vomited into it. But it was still in his system, and he flopped back down on the floor in the dark, covering his eyes with shaking bandaged hands, blocking out the visions of ghosts around him. “You’re all snakes, not just Andru, hiss hiss hissing, and I hate you.” How dignified. “Stop laughing!”
He wasn’t sure how long he lay there until he felt… more himself, and the hissing faded away to normal background levels, and the twitching and the urge to vibrate dwindled. An hour, maybe. Why had he done that? That was pointless and unpleasant. But then, reality was pointless, life was pointless, he supposed none of it mattered anyway. It hadn’t even helped with his migraine.
He wanted to do it again. More, this time. It wasn’t addiction talking – even glitterstim didn’t work that fast – but more like self-destructive teenage contrarianism. Maybe it hadn’t worked for his pain because he hadn’t taken enough. And if he was going to be light-headed and delirious anyway, the more the better, right? Take all of it. Maybe add alcohol. The holonet said that was a bad idea and he wanted to find out why.
He stuffed the remnants back in the hidey-hole instead. Whatever else, he wasn’t experimenting any more right now. What he really needed to do was make some calls. There were still certain people who needed to know about his condition and he was procrastinating. He climbed to his feet unsteadily, calling his mask to him, and after a minute or two to get over the head-rush, strode out to the holocomm in the central room, punched in a code. “Acrimonious.”
“Acrimonious here, Lord Kallig,” the night shift comm ensign responded, audio only.
He didn’t hear Pyron coming online. “Has Moff Pyron already retired?” What time was it? Dense idiot. Of course he had. He restrained a residual twitch.
“Yes, my lord. Shall I put you through?”
“Yes.”
A moment, then: “Moff Pyron here. Lord Kallig, what can I do for you?”
Murlesson hesitated. “It seems I’ll be handing you over to Laskaris sooner than I thought, Pyron.”
Pyron, too, was silent a moment to digest that. “Your illness has taken a turn?”
“It’s terminal. I don’t have long left. I don’t know how much. I’m going to stay here to fight Kel Reu Giri, and then you can serve a proper master.” If I didn’t know that was your attempt at sarcasm I might have said you were an embarrassment to the Sith for even thinking that.
“You have my condolences, my lord,” Pyron said gently. “I will always wonder what could have become of our relationship. And I will miss you.”
“What,” Murlesson said flatly. Was he still high? “Ridiculous.” The spluttering noises in his head agreed.
Pyron chuckled regretfully. “Best of luck in your battle, my lord. Keep me updated if you can.”
“…Goodbye.” He terminated the call before he could embarrass himself further. An excellent plan, if a bit late.
Calling Rylee and Destris was going to be much more difficult. Especially since he hadn’t figured out what to do with them yet. Despite everything, he still hadn’t made a will. Everything was a mess. There was too much to deal with. He almost didn’t want to take care of it. Just let everyone else deal with it. If it was difficult for them, so what? Everything had been difficult for him and he’d failed to overcome it. That was normal.
And yet… he… cared too much. They are not worth the dust on your boots. You should not care.
Rylee answered the comm. “Master! This is a surprise!” He was a couple days early for his regular check-in, that was true.
“Where’s Destris?” he asked.
Her happy smile faded. “I’ll fetch him. Have we done anything to displease you? Work on the CN-12 is progressing as fast as we can, we’re almost done…”
“No, it’s fine. Just go get him. I want to talk to both of you.” As if you were friends or something…
He leaned heavily on the holocomm until they both returned a few minutes later, looking anxious. “Yes, master?” Destris asked hesitantly.
He almost laughed. They still thought they were in trouble. Well, they were, but not from him. He took off his mask and they gasped. “So I’m dying.” Had the glitterstim changed anything about his face or was it just his usual diseased look? He probably should have checked first. Mistake after mistake after mistake-
“That can’t be!” Rylee cried. “That’s impossible, Master.”
“Nothing can kill you!” Destris said. “Paladius said he would, and he couldn’t.”
“Paladius was weak and a fool,” Murlesson said scathingly. “I’m neither, but I’ve been trying to control forces beyond any mortal’s power, and… I can’t.” He dropped his head. If it was weakness before his minions, so be it. It didn’t matter. “It’s killing me. Literally. I don’t know how long I have left. Days, maybe weeks if my parasites are generous. Not long.” No, not long at all.
“You have parasites?” Destris said, and Murlesson sensed he was going to follow up with some incredibly useless advice for dealing with physical bugs. “Have you seen a doctor-”
“Parasites of the soul,” Murlesson snapped, holding onto his temper with more difficulty than usual. “Do you think it would be that easy? Do you think I haven’t looked for an answer? There isn’t one. I am going to die. And there’s nothing anyone can do about it, not even me.” Ha! He deserves to get stepped on, the self-important pompous buffoon.
“S-sorry… Master…” Destris chewed his lips, looking like he really wanted to offer more solutions but couldn’t think of how to get around Murlesson’s put-down.
“We’ll pray for you!” Rylee cried, punching a fist into her open palm. “Everyone here. If everyone works together, I’m sure we can help!” What an ignorant little idealist.
He found it genuinely touching. “Well, it can’t hurt. It probably won’t save my life, so don’t feel bad when I die anyway.”
“Is there anything else we can do?” she asked plaintively, clasping her hands. “We- I care about you, Master. You’ve done so much for us, and everything we’ve done for you seems so small in comparison.”
What was it with people trying to find something to do right after he told them there wasn’t? “The magical part is, Rylee, you did most of it yourselves.” He managed to smile, because it was rather amusing. “I kept you safe and gave you direction; you built the cult into a beacon of power, a testament to what the destitute can do if given half a chance. You’ve come a long way since we met in the bowels of Nar Shaddaa. Yes, you did it because I told you to, but haven’t you also done it for yourselves?”
They absorbed that; Destris looked like this was a completely new idea. Even though he’d been preaching along those lines for a while. Rylee, though, was shrewder. “But even with everything we’ve done, Master, we still need you. Neither of us has the smarts to deal with the Hutts, and you know how Torga wants us.” At least they’re smart enough to guess how stupid they are.
“I know. I… don’t know what I ought to do for you.” Pyron, who needed their support the most for the CN-12, could do the least for them; turning them into an Imperial presence wouldn’t work at all. Xalek would not care for looking after them. Ashara might, but he wasn’t sure she was capable of dealing with Hutts either. That really left Aristheron, but did Aristheron want a cult? Or an isolated outpost on Nar Shaddaa? He’d been exasperated and skeptical when he first learned of it, and he might find it uncomfortable to deal with them. But… “Perhaps Lord Laskaris will be able to find a suitable guardian for you.” He could trust Aristheron to hand them on responsibly even if he didn’t want them himself. Yes, dump all your trash on your friend. I’m sure he will just love it all.
“I don’t want things to change,” Rylee said in a small voice. “I don’t want you to die. Please don’t die, Master.” How sweet. I almost wish we could see her face when you go.
She loved him, didn’t she? It wasn’t just his ego saying that, was it? But he didn’t feel the same for her. “I’m sorry, Rylee.”
There wasn’t anything else to say, was there? He stared at them, and they stared at him, at his corrupted face.
“I should go,” he said. “I need to rest. I’m helping Laskaris fight a Jedi and it’s exhausting.” And he still felt off from the glitterstim.
“Take care, Master,” Destris said. “If you need anything, you know where to find us.”
“We’ll be praying for you,” Rylee said. “We’ll go organize it right now. Sleep well, Master.”
The strange thing was, lying in bed ten minutes later, he really did feel something. Maybe the power of prayer wasn’t completely made up. At least not when the Force was involved.
“I’m not dying to you,” he told the grey-haired apparition. For one thing, that privilege was already being made use of.
“When the time comes, I will not need your approval,” Thanaton said, and lunged at him, fingers stretching into claws, face stretching into a gaping maw–
He was awakened from another near-screaming nightmare by his comm going off. “Kallig here.” At least he was already full of adrenaline if this was an emergency.
“Murlesson,” Aristheron’s voice rang urgently from the speaker, piercing his exhaustion and jolting him into real wakefulness. “Giri’s making a move. I need your assistance.”
So it was an emergency. “Where are you?” The Force was in torment, he could feel it already, the storm swelling to onslaught. It had been seeping into his dreams, twisting them past even his normal sickening routine. Maybe docking on the planet instead of the moon had been a terrible idea after all. He groaned as he dragged himself from his bed, his head throbbing agony. Those prayers weren’t helping that much right now.
“Downtown.”
“I’ll be right there.”
He grabbed a robe, grabbed his boots, belt, mask, and lightsaber, and yelled into the crew quarters to wake everyone up. “Revel! Get us in the air now!” Agitated even while Revel scrambled for the cockpit, he called Aristheron back. All he received was a busy signal. He called Vany instead. “What’s going on?”
He winced at the volume of the crash that reverberated through the comm. That sounded like a lightsaber duel in the background. “Giri’s attacking!” Vany cried. “He’s… super strong somehow, he’s knocking the whole freakin’ hotel down. We need your help!”
“You will have it. I assume the time for subtlety has passed.” Let us wreak havoc! Upon the Jedi, upon this world…
“Considering most of the front of the hotel is going, yeah, I’d say so!” Vany said, and screamed. “Watch out, Janelle!”
“Where is Sabran!?” Janelle cried in the background. “What have you done to them!? Tell me!” There was another crash.
“I’m on my way,” Murlesson said, watching from the back of the cockpit as Revel skipped most of the usual preflight checklist and gunned the engines.
The storm was thick and low above the fog as they lifted off into the black night; lightning flickered and thundered about them, and the Force seethed, seemingly aimlessly – but he knew there was a pattern there. Would he have time to figure out what it was? If only he could concentrate for two minutes…
“What’s that tower?” Ashara asked, pointing straight ahead at the slender beam looming over everything else, right in the heart of the city’s centre. Maybe 700 meters tall, with a ring of observation levels maybe three-quarters of the way up.
“Main planetary communications tower,” Murlesson said. “But we’re not going there.”
“Holy shit,” Revel breathed as they sped over the cityscape, Aristheron’s hotel coming into view – or what was left of it. “Looks like it got hit with a missile strike. You handwavers sure got a lotta power when you put your minds to it.” Perhaps he begins to glimpse what the Sith know instinctively.
“Or a whole planet’s mind to it,” Murlesson said grimly. The hotel was looking like a piece of holey cheese, and a huge chunk of the exterior appeared to be cratered off; as they watched, a puff of debris exploded from yet another wall. Aristheron had been the projectile that created the impact, but without missing a beat, he caught the edge of the hole and swung himself back to safety. He could sense everything – panicking patrons fleeing the building, Vany’s fear, Janelle’s strained serenity, Stroud’s frustrated fury, Aristheron’s stern resolve, and Giri’s mutated aura. It was changed completely from what he had last felt on Alderaan, maybe even more changed than his own. What had used to be a stoic grey presence was now a toxic black cloud, leeching strength and hope from the atmosphere.
Murlesson didn’t stay to watch any more visually, heading for the dorsal hatch onto the top of the Viper. Using the boarding ramp would take too long. Revel was putting down in the middle of the street, ignoring traffic entirely.
<This Jedi is a dangerous opponent, my master,> Khem said, right behind him. <I look forward to crushing him in my bare hands when we reach him.>
“I’ve missed you, Khem,” Murlesson said. Khem grunted.
He scrambled out onto the top of the Viper, looking for the glow of lightsabers above him. There was Aristheron’s scarlet, Giri’s yellow, Janelle’s green. Below the Viper, pedestrians were running and screaming, and all was chaos. This world is soft under Republic rule, it seems. He ignored them all as useless noise. Revel was adjusting the Viper’s altitude to the correct floor but he couldn’t get right up close to the damaged building. The lights were out on several floors, and the interior was dark and jagged-looking from all the demolished walls. He could sense the weight of the building, starting to pull and lean slightly, so many of the front supports knocked out by Giri’s explosive entrance.
Could he make that jump still? He had to. He had to. Ashara and Xalek were up there with him. He shook his head violently, trying to clear it. He needed focus. What’s the matter? Are we being distracting? “Yes, actually,” he muttered. Hiss away all you like, it won’t change a thing.
He clenched his teeth and jumped, supernaturally high but still clumsy, hitting the floor hard and rolling awkwardly to his feet, cold sweat pouring off him. Ashara and Xalek were with him, Khem behind them, but Drellik had wisely stayed back on the Viper. Aristheron was holding his ground in the next room, breathing hard, aristocratic brow furrowed against the Fallen Jedi before him lurking in the shadows. Janelle was beside him, apparently having given up on words for now.
“So you’ve summoned your allies,” Giri said, looking them over. “They will not avail you. Your end is inevitable.”
“I was going to say the same about you,” Aristheron said, drawing himself up. He moved forward, saber in a high guard position. Giri suddenly lunged, and Aristheron blocked, getting pushed back a step. Xalek came darting in on the right and Giri knocked him away with a gesture, throwing him through a hallway to the other end of the building. Giri had been a good duellist before, but to see the jump in strength was still a shock. Think… how could they get through this power, through the layers of Darkness that formed an almost physical barrier around the former Jedi?
Aristheron was the only one not yielding ground to Giri, retaking his lost step and then taking one more. However good he had been last time they fought together, he was clearly in a league of his own now. Every stroke had such heavy power behind it Murlesson winced, and yet he was so smooth, so fluid it was difficult to follow. Murlesson always cheated by tweaking the minds of his enemies, but Aristheron didn’t need to. And he still hadn’t lost control; though he was hard pressed against this assault, his sense was barely glimmering around the edges.
“Where is Sabran?” Ashara asked, moving to a flanking position. “Did we ever find out?”
“Nope,” Janelle said grimly. “He’s hiding them. And I have a bad feeling about it.”
“Sabran is no longer your concern, Janelle,” Giri said, glancing side-to-side to keep everyone in view, unimpressed with the lot of them. “You are a traitor and have no right to know.”
“Sabran is always my concern,” Janelle said, her spirit flaring. “Everyone is my concern! Maybe I betrayed the Republic, a little bit – but you’ve betrayed the Jedi! You’ve betrayed everyone! Jedi are supposed to help people! What do you think you’re doing!?”
“The role of the Jedi is to eliminate the Sith,” Giri said. “That is how the Jedi help the galaxy. When the Sith are gone, you would thank me for it if you lived to see it – but you will not, for you are Fallen though you still clutch at the Light.”
“You’ve become a worse monster than any Sith!” Janelle cried. “I’m not Fallen… but you are, and it is my duty to stop you.” She glanced at Aristheron and Ashara, and together with Xalek and Khem they all closed in.
Blocking Murlesson, who now had no space to see what Force lightning did to Giri’s defences. He scrambled to one side, nearly tripping over half a singed side-table, but the movement before him was quick as flames – and no one was getting through to Giri. Strategy! What was best in this situation-
He flung himself to the floor as Giri stretched out his hand, a blastwave ripping over his head and carrying a heavy armoire with it. He heard the wood shatter on the Viper’s hull, heard Drellik yelp as he was sprayed with splinters. He could sense Major Stroud and Vany were carefully making their way down to the same level through a series of holes in the floors; apparently Aristheron had been knocked through multiple floors? And he was still moving as he was?
Invincible as Aristheron may have seemed, they weren’t going to make head-way on their enemy if they couldn’t coordinate. With them all attacking Giri simultaneously, they were not overwhelming him, they were getting in each others’ way! The close confines of the hotel rooms, the obstacles of debris, they were playing to Giri’s advantage. “Hey-!”
“What’s up, bastards!?” Stroud yelled, kicking his way through a flimsy hotel door that was still standing even though there was a perfectly serviceable hole in the wall beside it. Great, the comic relief was here and they would have to be protected.
“Language!” Vany hissed from behind him.
“Sorry, ma’am…”
“Stay back and let us handle this,” Murlesson managed to grit out before they could get themselves hurt. The battle was still blazing away awkwardly before him, a flickering, buzzing rainbow of lightsabers, and he lifted his hands to try and hold Giri down, slow him so that Aristheron could start stabbing him properly, but even with all his stolen strength he couldn’t seem to assert his will over Giri’s. He growled in frustration, gasping for air through his mask. We are fighting an entire planet, being wielded by one acclaimed a Master of the Force, you realize. You want to win, get angrier! Let your hatred flow!!
He felt the shift in the Force as Ashara looked out the front. “We’re going to have company!” She was trying to stay calm, stay in the Light, but apprehension was rising up to swallow her sense. He looked out too, to see Republic military vehicles closing in. A pair of starfighters blasted by overhead. And the Force was thickening about them all, the webs of destiny tightening around them…
“Hostile forces, stand down!” someone was blaring through a megaphone. Squinting into the dark showed a humanoid that might be a Cathar, if the ears were any indication. “Master Giri, unknown combatants, stand down! This is Commander Ry Min of the Republic Armed Forces of Salvara! I repeat, lower your weapons and stand down!”
“Eight-legged son of a Florn Lamproid!” Murlesson snarled, frustrated. They couldn’t fight all of that and Giri with his current power and wards. They needed to regroup, and Giri could not be allowed to pick the next battlefield. “Frakking heard her the first time. Aristheron!” None of us like running… but you are making the smart decision now. A snake strikes best when unexpected, after all.
“Get everyone on the Viper, now!” Aristheron said. “Vany, go!”
“Going!”
“Orders, boss?” Revel asked.
“Hold position,” Murlesson said. “We’re on our way, I hope you’re ready to go in a hurry.”
“You know me,” Revel drawled. “Try to get it done before those fighters come back.”
“Running already?” Giri said, making Force-shifting motions – Ashara moved to block whatever it was he was targeting Vany with, was pushed back several paces by what looked like a severe invisible blow, and Vany ducked and winced but wasn’t struck back. Oh, so now they could coordinate. Better late than never…
Janelle was right behind Vany. “Don’t be afraid to jump. I’ll guide you.” Vany ran to the edge of the room and leaped, and Janelle half-carried her with a gesture to safety on the Viper’s hull.
“Can you do that for me too?” Stroud asked, sounding doubtful and amused.
Janelle snorted. “Of course I can. Go!” Stroud jumped, followed by Janelle and Ashara.
Aristheron and Khem and Xalek were holding back Giri, physically at least, but as Ashara leaped towards the Viper, a wave of malevolence rose from Giri, stronger than before. Murlesson growled and braced himself, hands clawed as he resisted it, contained it, as much as he could-! He skidded back almost to the edge of the floor, heard Ashara cry out as the edge of the wave hit her, slamming her to the Viper’s hull. He growled. “You bitch…! Don’t you-!”
Hatred twisted inside him, distorted power rushing through him as he forgot everything except the currents of the Force, how it raged towards him like a hurricane – and how he met it with his own wild, uncontrolled storm. Lightning sparkled around him, randomly striking the walls around him and leaving smoking pock-marks.
“Murlesson!” Ashara called to him from behind him. “Come on, we have to go! We can’t fight everyone like this!”
Just knowing she was all right, even though he heard the wince in her voice, the bruises in her spirit, brought him back under control. “Xalek, move your frakking arse! Khem, you too!”
<Curse the Republic for interfering,> Khem growled as he went.
Murlesson and Aristheron glanced at each other. They could hear the starfighters returning, and now they had no one behind to support them, Giri sprang forward, lightsaber raised, the Force besieging them. Aristheron spun, teeth gritted in concentration, matching blow for blow. “Go, Murlesson.”
“You’d better be behind me!” Murlesson cried, and stumbled backwards towards the opening in the wall. He could sense perfectly where the Viper was, how the Republic forces were forming in the sky beyond, how everyone was waiting for him and Aristheron, but… the jump back suddenly seemed even more terrifying than the jump forward.
It wasn’t like he had much to lose, and he flung out a hand, singing Giri’s sleeve with lightning as he threw himself backwards, feeling Janelle and Xalek and even Ashara’s weak efforts bolster his own, pulling him to safety. He fell over as he landed with a pained grunt, and looked up as Aristheron landed beside him. If there was no one left in there beside Giri – he strained and pulled, squeezing his eyes shut and drawing on all the power he could access, dredging up almost everything left in him. Kill him KILL HIM! The building groaned as it began to collapse around the Jedi, so much of it weakened on those floors that he could just yank and feel it give, a tiny bit at first, then a bit more-
It wasn’t nearly fast enough and he felt the malice rushing at them, snapped open his eyes to see Giri leap after them out of the collapsing hotel, lightsaber raised with Darkness forming around him like a cold spear of doom–
Reflexes took over and he switched from pulling to pushing, instinctively moving his gift to keep the Jedi away. The Viper lurched wildly under him even as Revel ignited the thrusters, dipping away from Giri- Janelle gasped as she nearly lost her balance- the ghosts were hissing to drown out everything else- Darkness stabbed, cold and swift and lethal-
Giri clawed at the edge of the Viper’s hull and fell, tumbling down to land – unharmed, of course – on the debris-strewn street below. For a moment, it seemed like he would reach out to drag them back down and prevent them from escaping. Or worse, strike them with that massive blast he’d just been preparing.
But the hotel was falling forward now in ruin, furniture sliding down to shatter on the street, duracrete and plaster raining around Giri, and the Jedi even with all his power had enough to do to shield himself against the deadly shower of debris.
Aristheron’s hand was clamped around Murlesson’s upper arm, dragging him towards the hatch as the Viper accelerated under them. “Get in before the fighters start shooting!” There was the hatch, and he slid in feet first, collapsing carelessly about five meters to the inner deck, curling around himself as the Viper slid through the sky, laserfire hissing through the atmosphere perilously close to the shields. Everyone else was inside, and Aristheron was just coming down the ladder, locking the hatch securely behind him. “Revel, feel free to leave atmosphere at any time.”
“You got it,” Revel said. “By the way, what the hell was that lurch? The Jedi hit us?”
“I pushed,” Murlesson rasped, allowing Ashara to drag him to his feet and then reeling away under the shifting gravity caused by Revel’s evasive manoeuvres and the pain in his body, unfelt under the adrenaline of the fight but now rising yet again to the surface. “Kept the Jedi from hitting us.”
“It was really impressive,” Ashara said. “You’re so cool.” It was not impressive at all. Panicked flailing when you could have used the shift to your advantage.
“Should we stop by Miruta?” Murlesson asked, collapsing on the lounge – leaving space for others this time. His breath was slowly returning, and he could now realize just how damn tired he was.
Aristheron shook his head, putting an arm around Vany as she came to hug him. She was so tiny next to him. “We cannot reach the Kollyrion now. We cannot waste a second for the Republic to catch up.” He ground his teeth. “We could have had him if the Republic had not intervened.”
“We needed better coordination for that,” Murlesson said. “You’re a great duellist, and Ashara’s a great duellist, and Xalek and Khem are hardened warriors, and Janelle is…”
“I’m good enough,” Janelle said, more amused than insulted.
“But that cramped space played to his advantage. It’s hard to communicate when there’s nowhere to go.”
“Jumping to hyperspace in fifteen seconds, if you’re not strapped in,” Revel said, and Murlesson slid upright enough to get a seatbelt around his waist as some of the others scrambled for safety. “Micro-jumping to lose these jokers, and then we’ll make the real jump out of here. Where to?”
“Talcene,” Aristheron said, bracing himself against the acceleration without so much as sitting down.
“What’s the plan?” Murlesson asked. “Is it time to show them just who they’re dealing with?” Darkness curled around him, frustration, impatience, hatred, rage. That’s the way. But no, he forced it back down before it could burst out inappropriately. He was going to pop like a shaken soda if this went on too long. The Viper slowed back out of hyperspace already to sublight speeds and hung, Revel no doubt calculating their next jump.
“Yes,” Aristheron said. “It does not matter what the Republic thinks of this any longer. I will take actions to protect my planet that has been mishandled by their ignorance and complacency.”
“They would stop it if they could,” Janelle said wearily. “Even if they knew, what could they do?”
“They could get a bunch of important Jedi to come kick his butt,” Vany said. “Couldn’t they? Like Jedi police or something?”
“Jedi police… ‘who watches the watchers’, kind of thing?” Janelle grimaced. “I can’t believe he was talking like that. I still can’t believe he’s doing all of this, and I travelled with him a while. What could have possessed him to go this far?”
“Power,” Murlesson said. “Obsession with an frustrating, unstoppable opponent. The inability to know when to quit.” He grinned ironically inside his mask. Do you describe yourself, or your nemesis? I wonder, if you had reached for the kind of power the Jedi did, how much more it would twist you than simply allowing us to take hold of you. “Your fleet is at Talcene, yes? I will order mine to meet them there.” And the Viper shot back into hyperspace as he said it.
“I’d like to attack at dawn,” Aristheron said. “After the excitement of tonight, they will not expect us to return so soon.”
“I’m hungry,” Vany whispered. “I’m raiding your pantry.” Stroud followed her – and so did Xalek.
“I can field six Destroyers plus support,” Murlesson said, hoping Pyron would be able to meet that deadline. “I’m a little short on infantry; I can only field five battalions.” Well, Aristheron’s fleet could always make a first wave and Pyron a second wave, catch the Republic off-guard – but he’d prefer to sweep with overwhelming force to begin with. Naga Sadow would probably agree. While it might be more efficient to be cleverer with fewer resources, the psychological message was important, and a simpler plan was more difficult to muck up.
“I have similar numbers,” Aristheron said. “The infantry do not have to overwhelm the Republic, only hold them off long enough for us to succeed.”
“Neato,” Revel said, appearing in the cockpit door. “We’ll be there in a couple hours.”
Murlesson acknowledged him with a languid glance. “Then that should keep the local Republic at bay… and between us, we have enough ships to prevent reinforcements from arriving by air and to demolish the space defences.”
“Agreed. When our forces are assembled at Talcene, we shall set out immediately back for Salvara. I will coordinate with Pyron and Clay.” Aristheron leaned over, putting a hand on Murlesson’s shoulder. “And now, you should rest.”
“What-!? But-” He’s already taking your fleet. It was never yours. He knows you’re weak.
“Go rest!” Aristheron commanded him, interrupting and overriding every one of his arguments. “You’re ill, you’re tired, and this battle will push us all to our limits, especially you. You need every moment of rest you can take right now.”
“He’s right,” Drellik said. “You must take care of yourself, now more than ever!”
Revel grunted in agreement. “You’re barely conscious right now. A wise pirate sleeps when he can, remember?”
“Not a pirate,” Murlesson mumbled grumpily. Not a pirate, when you stole an entire fleet… little thieving snake? It was grossly irritating, and he hated that Aristheron was right; hated being sent off like a child. In front of everyone, too! “If you’re going to make a big deal out of it, fine.” He hauled himself to his feet; only pride kept him from immediately collapsing. “Good night, then.”
“Sleep well,” Ashara said. “We’ll call Pyron and take care of everything, don’t worry.”
“I wasn’t worried.”
Alone in his cabin again, he rolled about restlessly. What was sleep!? How did Aristheron expect him to sleep even if he was so tired his eyeballs were just about melting out of his head??
If he wasn’t allowed to help in strategizing, there were a few personal things he could be thinking about. If there was anything he’d left undone that he really wanted to do before he died. Besides killing people, because that task would never end, or to control a shadow empire of agents and lies that eventually toppled the actual Empire. Oh, he’d had a list – to go on more proper archaeology expeditions, write a book, infuse a holocron – consume more holocrons, while he was at it – visit Naga Sadow’s true tomb, visit the Republic to see if it was all it was cracked up to be – not likely, was it? It wasn’t when I was there last.
No. None of that was really important, was it? It was all nebulous, hypothetical, vague desires that didn’t really mean anything. Nothing meant anything anymore.
But there was someone who still meant something. He still hadn’t spent enough time with Ashara. Just the memories of what they’d had before everything went wrong, those few short days where he could hold her and kiss her and they didn’t fight so much and his headaches were just headaches and not perpetual migraines, it… hurt like getting stabbed. And he already felt like he was being stabbed. He wanted… just once more… just one night…
Just one night, hmm?
He sat up, tense in the darkness. While he would rather not deal with his parasites… “What do you want?”
They glimmered before him; Kalatosh looked ready to attack, but was being held back by… Horak-Mul? Ergast spread his hands. We already have almost everything we want. But what would you do, for a night with your woman?
What would he do? “Why are you even offering to bargain?”
We’re not offering anything out of mercy, foolish boy. Everything we could want will come with time, whether you struggle or not. But if you’d like to beg for it… we might be amused enough to grant you some semblance of happiness before the end.
No! cried Kalatosh, seething. He’s not good enough! I will wreak my vengeance on him if you allow this!
Now, now, Horak-Mul said. We are Sith. We have dignity. We can be slightly magnanimous in victory.
He wanted to say they hadn’t won yet, but even a small chance to be with Ashara without getting torn apart wasn’t one to be tossed away. Of course they could still be toying with him… The word of a Sith was only slightly better than air, on average, and he knew that as a Sith himself. “So if I want to not die a virgin, I need to grovel and suffer Kalatosh’s retaliation.”
That sounds appropriate, Ergast said.
I don’t like this, Andru said. But do as you will, little snake. It’s not like you’ll be able to breed. That was true. Zabrak and Togruta were infertile together. He hadn’t planned to have children anyway.
He was already on his knees, and he bowed his head to the mattress. “Please, then. Please… let me see her. Let me be with her.”
You’ll have to try a lot harder than that, Horak-Mul said in boredom.
Pretty please with a cherry on top was not going to help in this situation. He did have a lot of practice in groveling, and let some of his feelings out – his pain, his despair, his desperation. Maybe someone else would have been uncomfortable over it. He no longer cared. “Please! I beg you, lords, just one night – just a couple hours, please!” He was probably going to actually cry for real.
Keep going, Ergast said, waving his hand.
It was maybe ten minutes before they nodded to each other, apparently satisfied with his abject humiliation. Much longer and he won’t have time to spend on anything else, Ergast said. Enjoy yourself… for the last time.
They faded into the darkness, and miracle of miracles, his head cleared – not completely, but after what he’d been enduring all this time, he might as well have been completely cured. He put his hands to his head, just to feel the lack of ache, almost crying again at how it felt. Gods, his pillows were soft, and now he could feel them fully, appreciate them with the same intensity he’d appreciated real food after a lifetime of slavery.
But even that discovery was unimportant. “Ashara!” he called out, with his voice and the Force, and felt her respond sleepily. “Ashara!” he called again, standing and going to his door, feeling realization flood her mind as she jumped out of bed in the crew quarters and hurried to him.
“Yes, what is it?” she said breathlessly as he opened the door for her, and gasped to see him up, and he stared to see her, wonderfully dishevelled in her pyjama tank-top and shorts.
Slowly, he reached a bandaged hand out to her, and she reached out to him in turn, their fingers touching gently and interlacing. No pain, at least no new pain. He stared at her in wide-eyed awe. They really were leaving him alone.
She shook her head in incomprehension. “You’re- don’t tell me- how did you-?”
“I… didn’t,” he had to admit. Best not to admit they were giving him a chance to seduce her; she might suggest it on her own anyway. “They gave me one… one last chance to… feel myself again.”
“How? Why?” she asked. “Sith don’t just… be nice like that.”
“I had to beg for it,” he said. “I don’t want to talk about it.” She nodded. “But if they don’t go back on their word, I wanted to… Please, stay with me for whatever time I have.”
She stepped forward and hugged him, carefully at first, then squeezing tighter as he felt no mental attacks. He had to hold himself back from throwing himself at her, physically or mentally, at her warm light that he’d missed, that made him feel less broken. “Yes, I will. I’m here for you.”
“Carpe diem, as they used to say…”
She peered up at him. “You want to buy a fish?”
“What?” He stared. “Carpe, not carp-”
“Carpet yum?”
“Ashara.”
She was giggling. “I couldn’t resist. What language is that?”
He’d missed how she turned her ignorance into wit, and despite his intellectual disapproval, found his mood lightening. “A very old dialect, supposedly from before the Jedi and the Sith parted ways. Only fragments survive, and that’s one of them.”
“Huh.” She reached out to close the door, turned up the lights a little bit, then tugged him over to the bed. He wondered if she could feel his heartrates increase, and struggled to keep his feelings hidden. He didn’t want to scare her. Screw that, he was pretty scared himself, and he wanted this. “Even if you’re feeling better for a while, you should take this opportunity to get some proper rest. I know it feels like a waste, but we have to be fighting in a few hours.”
“I know.” He ought to just ask. But he hesitated still.
She sat and made him sit before her on the edge of the mattress, then took his hands. “How are you doing with these?” He watched as she began to unwrap his fingers. She’d find out soon enough, and her forehead wrinkled in distress as she carefully peeled the bandages away and blood ran down his fingers. “Oh Force. I can’t imagine this pain.”
He shrugged. She took his right hand in both of hers and he felt her Force flowing into him, trying to staunch the bleeding, to slow the decay. He wished he could do that. “It’s not going to help much, you know. You may as well save your energy.”
“Every little bit I can help is worth it,” she said. “If it helps you at all, when this reprieve has passed, I’ll be happy. If you can sleep for one night without bandages, it will be worth it, won’t it?”
He let her do it. It did lessen the pain slightly. After a few minutes she switched to his other hand, and eventually, his feet. He tried not to think about how close his bones were to the surface.
Finally she seemed to be done, and he was healed enough not to bleed all over his sheets, and she seemed tired. She went to wash her hands, then hit the lightswitch and came to lie in her old spot, pulling him down beside her. He melted against her warmth, against her soul – and the chance to nuzzle his face into her full chest without retaliation. It was so soft…! She chuckled as he found a comfortable spot, his arms wrapped around her, unbandaged fingers pressed against her back, her arms draped over his head and shoulders, her chin angled so she didn’t scratch herself on his horns. “You like boobs, huh?”
“Of course,” he mumbled. “If this was my last night alive, at least I’ve had this chance.”
For some reason that was hilarious to her. Her laughter was soothing, as was her steady heartbeat in his ear, but his thoughts were already turning melancholy again. For all he knew, this could be his last night alive. Maybe he would fall while fighting Giri. That would be the best outcome, wouldn’t it?
He pulled his face out of her chest and looked up at her. If he were doomed to become a ghost when he died, he wanted her face to be with him to stave off insanity as long as possible.
“What is it?” she whispered. She was starting to blush. “The staring is… getting kinda unnerving.”
Maybe his eyes were unduly serious and unblinking for the moment they were in… His arms tightened around her, the incredible tragic unfairness welling up in his throat. “I haven’t had enough time with you. …I could never have enough time with you. …I’m greedy. I want more. I want everything.” He closed his eyes to keep his emotions in check. “I could spend a full Zabrak lifetime with you and it wouldn’t be enough. Maybe a Wookiee lifetime.”
He heard a sniffle and felt her move to wipe away tears. She really did feel emotions so easily. “Don’t cry for me. I spend enough time feeling sorry for myself as it is.”
“I don’t want to grieve you before you’re gone, but I…” She sniffled again. “I haven’t had enough time with you either!”
He reached up to touch her tears before she could smear them all over her face. “Your tears won’t heal me or bring me back to life when I die. Save them for someone who matters… like Drellik. He’s the weakest person here, and yet he’s the one who’s accomplished the most real work.”
“That’s not true,” she whispered, stroking his hair. “You brought hundreds of people out of despair. Rylee and Destris and your cult, Pyron and his fleet, Xalek, maybe even Khem… And you’ve done so much for me, you’ve supported me as I discovered who I am and what I believe in, even if you k- even if you didn’t always agree. …I’ll cry for you if I want to, dammit!”
“I’ve already hurt you far more than you should ever be hurt, and I wish… I wish I hadn’t.”
“That’s what happens when you’re in love,” she said. “Love doesn’t hurt, but the things around it can hurt. I forgive you.”
How could she forgive the wounds he’d carved into her spirit? He turned to kiss her heart, through the tank-top between her breasts, and felt her gasp in surprise. He hesitated a moment more, then surged upwards, kissing over her collarbone, her throat, to the narrow gap between under her jaw and her lekku; he tasted tear-salt there, wet on his lips. She gasped again, longer and louder, arching under him, her pulse thrumming, arousal rising through her sense to match his own.
He pulled back, leaning over her in the dark. He tried to ask, his mouth hanging open, but then she pulled him down to kiss her mouth, those pink lips he’d missed so, so much.
He managed to wrest control of his tongue over his nerves when he pulled away for the air he so desperately needed. “Would you- Could we- If you wanted to-” And it seemed he might as well not have tried at all. What even were words!?
“I thought you’d never stammeringly half-ask,” she said, smiling. “Yes, I’d like that. Although we’re not getting any sleep tonight, are we?”
“We’re young, we can go without,” he said. “Caf tomorrow. Loads of it.”
“Oh good, I’ll be literally bouncing off the walls while I fight,” she grumbled, and pulled him back in for another kiss, with her tongue in his mouth and her hands in his hair. Lust was flooding his veins, all the stronger for having been repressed so long.
And then she was the one to push him back, sitting up and pulling her tank-top off, and he lost the ability to breathe.
“What?” she asked defensively as he stared hungrily. “L-like what you see, huh?”
He wasn’t quite sure what to say, but he could touch, couldn’t he? “S-soft…” Softer than her lekku, which he also ought to show more attention to, but…
She giggled, then suddenly squealed as he dove on her. “Ack! Gently, please!”
“You,” he said in between mouthing kisses all over her, chest and face and lekku, “are a world of mystery to me…”
She poked him. “Did you just call me fat?”
“Oh my gods, Ashara.” She snickered, and he couldn’t help it, he laughed with her.
She was shining in his arms, the undertones of sorrow not enough to dampen the Light of her spirit, and it just made her more beautiful. His Darkness loomed over her, but it could never overcome her. Darkness craved the Light, and Light was fascinated with Darkness, both seeking to consume or destroy each other, to become one – and this was getting uncomfortably close to the Unified Force theory.
She was… uncharacteristically shy as he moved down her toned body, determined to learn everything he could about her. The bruises across her hip and side from falling on the Viper earlier were beginning to darken, and he was cautious around them. “What’s the matter?” he asked, pausing at her feet.
“Er… it’s just…” She fidgeted. “This is my first time, and I know it’s your first time, and, well… I know you’re really into me, I’m just worried…” He waited patiently. “I hope I’m… pretty… enough?”
Was that all? “Ashara. You’re the most beautiful woman in the galaxy to me.” His voice was deep and soft with conviction, and she shivered at it. He ran his damaged hands up her calves and found a scar on her right shin – the remains of the blaster bolt she’d taken for him over Zeltros. Kolto had healed it pretty well, but there was still a little circle there. She’d done that for him, before she even really knew him. She’d protected him just because he asked her to – sure it was for strategic reasons, but she’d trusted him when she didn’t really have a reason to yet, and been wounded for him. It was incomprehensible, in the best way. “All of you is beautiful.” He lowered his head and kissed the scar, and she moaned.
“You’re so sexy,” she said. “Between that voice, and that accent, and the way you touch me, I’m a complete puddle.”
He paused before he started trying to kiss a trail up past her knee. “My accent?” He’d thought it was a fairly ordinary Commenorean accent.
“Yesss,” Ashara sighed dreamily. “Ssso sexy.”
“If you say so.” But she sang breathily under his fingers so she must have been telling the truth. He was only slightly disappointed she didn’t taste of tangerines.
When she came, it was with a cry and a burst of energy that slid every loose object in the room a centimetre to the left. It seemed she only enjoyed her completion – and allowed him to relish his success – for a brief moment before she sprang up, full of energy, if slightly dizzy for a second. “Your turn!” She reached for his sleeping tunic and he froze up, pulling away. “What’s wrong?”
He had to snort at his own foolishness. “I’m afraid of the same things you are. But you’re beautiful. Your skin is warm and smooth and your scars are testaments to your courage. I’m… a wreck.” A scrawny, lanky gremlin crisscrossed with hidden mutilations and falling apart at the edges. Some boyfriend. He already counted himself lucky that she allowed his hideous, diseased, half-corpse to touch her, that she liked his touch – the possibility that she’d reject him once she saw him was too much.
Her forehead scrunched up in concern. “It’s okay. I’ve seen your scars. I accept them. They’re a testament to your survival against all odds.”
His odds had already run out. “You’ve seen my scars?” He looked at her sharply, a strange feeling of having his privacy invaded. Which was irrational, and yet-
“When we brought you in after you challenged Thanaton,” she said slowly. “We took all your clothes off to bandage you in kolto, Drellik and me. So… yeah. I know about it.”
He was silent a moment, then reached up to pull his tunic off over his head. He’d retain control over that, at least, and she let him, then scooted closer to touch his body, the scars on his chest, his neck, his back, his arms, scars from slavery, scars from battle. She rested her head against his bony chest as she embraced him, and he felt tears again. “I accept you,” she said again. “You’re fine the way you are. I wish your past had been less horrible, but it doesn’t change who you are.”
“Illogical,” he said, putting his arms around her, stroking the lekku running down her back. “It’s changed me immensely.”
“I still love who you are,” she said, trying so hard to find something positive to say. She didn’t have to, but he knew she would anyway. “I can’t read your thoughts, but I can read your feelings, and you’re exaggerating. You’re not hideous. You’re gorgeous, even ill. And I love you.” He shook his head, not able to believe her. “I wish we had time for me to come to the point where I can move past your scars – not that I wouldn’t see them, but that I don’t cry over them-”
“Don’t cry.” He’d already said.
She sighed, giving up on the positive words thing. Finally. “The question I really have is why you don’t have more tattoos. Don’t Zabrak usually have them all over?”
He was surprised she’d even ask. “I just got the ones on my face so no one would look harder at me for not having them. No one was supposed to see me naked and question my lack of Zabrak accomplishment.” Sarcasm crept into his voice.
“Oh, is that what they’re for?” Her fingers traced old wounds across his side and he flinched and she stopped.
“I probably wouldn’t have a lot on my body yet even if I’d been raised properly. I’d only barely be an adult.” And he understood the pale-skinned Zabrak of Iridonia had a completely different tattoo culture involving just their faces – she must have been doing some research of her own to know the red-skinned Zabrak tribes did their whole bodies. That was… flattering.
She smiled up at him. “You’ve done tons of things. But if it’s not important to you, then you shouldn’t get them. …Er… look, stop me if I do something you don’t like, okay?”
She was amazing at everything she did, and loving him was no exception. He’d accidentally shorted out another ceiling light as she’d taken him to undreamt-of heights. Forget drugs. They were nothing compared to this. Now they were a tangled pile of sweaty limbs and lekku, breathing together, moving together, an unfamiliar soul-searing dance that his body miraculously knew on its own. His soul clung to hers clung to his, her Light cradling his warped Darkness, touching that tiny spark inside him so that he felt vulnerable and almost whole in the same moment.
“I love you,” she whispered.
“Foolish Jedi,” he whispered back.
“Arrogant Sith,” she retorted. “I love you.”
“I love you.”
“I don’t tell you often enough.”
“If that’s the case, I definitely don’t tell you often enough.”
“Yeah, I think that’s the first time you said it.”
That startled him. Was it really? “I didn’t believe in love before we went on a date. It all seemed fake. I still don’t know what this is. I still don’t know if I really believe in love. But this is what people refer to as love, isn’t it?”
“Yeah? What’s confusing about it?”
Love was supposed to be some kind of perfect emotion. Nothing could be perfect. How was it so easy for her to accept? He hesitated. “What is love to you?”
“Of caring so much for the person you… well, that you love, that… you want them to be as happy as possible. No matter what.”
“No matter what?” She ought not to use such words lightly. But everything else she said… it sounded right.
“I hope so,” she said. “No, yes. No matter what.”
“I won’t hold you to that,” he said. “Regardless… I’ve never felt this way about anyone, ever, and I don’t think – even if I survived – I could feel this way again about anyone else. So… I love you.” If only he could give her his soul, if only he hadn’t signed it away for power! But if he hadn’t, he’d be dead, and he would never have met her…
She shuddered at his voice. “Murlesson-”
‘If only we could stay like this forever’ was one of the cheesiest lines in Lightning Strikes My Heart, and he’d scoffed at it when it came up, but – now he understood it, maybe, a little. Not that he was going to say it, it was still frakking cheesy. “Ashara.”
Sparks literally flew, everything in the cabin went ‘thump’, and he collapsed on top of her with his hearts trying to pound their way through his chest. She clutched him close, despite the over-warmth of their sweaty bodies, and he held her tightly, imprinting her in his memory, her curves, her skin, her scent. If tomorrow were his last day, he might almost be able to say he died happy.