Chapter II
The cue struck home again. Another ball disappeared into a pocket with a decisive thunk, leaving a scattering of colors and angles across the table. Serina straightened, exhaling softly through her nose as she observed the new layout. Each ball was a problem to solve, a path to be taken or manipulated. And like all things, the correct answer was never left to chance—only to skill, foresight, and control.Control.
The word whispered through her mind, not in a menacing way, not in some grand declaration of tyranny, but in something far more intimate. It was not power for power's sake that drove her; it was the certainty, the structure of things bending to her will, of seeing an outcome and knowing that it was hers to shape. There was something deeply satisfying about taking a chaotic, unformed moment and making it obey.
She lined up another shot, pausing as she thought back to the reports. The inefficiencies in the fortress' construction gnawed at her—not just because they delayed her plans, but because they represented something uncontrolled. Something imperfect.
A breath. She focused. The next shot was difficult, a tight angle requiring finesse.
She sank it effortlessly.
Her eyes flicked over to a nearby datapad as she walked around the table. The screen still displayed the labor reports, and in particular, the small note about the two fatalities this rotation.
There was no hesitation in how she viewed their deaths. She had long since passed the point where such losses troubled her conscience. The fortress demanded labor, labor required sacrifice, and if some broke under the weight of it, then they were unfit for the grander work. That was the way of things. That was efficiency.
And yet…
Her hand, idly resting on the table's edge, curled into a loose fist. She stared at the glowing numbers on the screen, the cold figures, the reduction of human lives into mere calculations of output and attrition. Even now, she recognized the convenience of it, the neatness.
Did she care? No, not in the way that a Jedi would. Not in the way that soft-hearted fools wept over the price of their ambitions. But the part of her that demanded control chafed at the wastefulness of it all. A dead laborer was one less set of hands to move the stone, one more delay to be corrected. She did not mourn them, but she resented them for failing.
For not being strong enough to matter.
She took another shot. The cue ball snapped against the remaining cluster, scattering the remaining obstacles in a way she did not anticipate. Her jaw tensed. She had not intended for that. A miscalculation.
Her grip tightened on the cue. Even here, in this moment of solitude, in this game where no one watched, no one judged—she could feel the need crawling under her skin, the unbearable irritation at even the smallest instance of unpredictability.
Control was not just a desire. It was a hunger, gnawing at her every moment, whispering in the back of her mind that nothing, nothing was ever truly stable.
Everything had to be grasped. Held firm. Bent to order. Because to lose control was to be controlled.
And she would not allow that.
Not by the Jedi, not by the Sith, not by fate itself.
Serina exhaled slowly, setting the cue aside. The irritation faded, or rather, she willed it to fade. Another test of dominance—if not over the world, then over herself.
The fortress would be completed. The laborers would learn efficiency or be replaced. And one day, the galaxy itself would be arranged like this table, its pieces set into perfect order, each ball moving exactly as she dictated.
But for now, she picked up her glass, took a slow sip, and let the amber warmth of the liquor smooth the edges of her thoughts.
The glass was cool against her lips, the amber liquid warming her throat as she took a slow sip. She let it sit on her tongue for a moment, savoring the bite, the way it burned just enough to remind her she was alive. It was one of the few indulgences she allowed herself—good liquor, well-aged and properly distilled, the kind that took patience and precision to create.
Patience. Precision.
That was what made something great. That was what separated masters from fools. What Serina was still trying to learn.
Serina set the glass down carefully, her fingers lingering on its rim. She could have downed the rest in one motion, but that would have been wasteful. Everything had a proper rhythm, a method. Even something as trivial as drinking was another opportunity for control—another exercise in mastery over impulse.
It wasn't that she denied herself pleasure. She was not some self-flagellating Jedi monk, afraid of indulgence, afraid of what enjoyment meant. She simply despised excess. Those who drank to drown themselves, to numb their minds, to slip into some thoughtless haze of pleasure—they were weak. They were surrendering to something beyond themselves.
She never surrendered.
She reached for the cue again, rolling it between her fingers. The smooth wood was another comfort—not in the way one might clutch something sentimental, but in the way an artist felt comfort in their brush, or a duelist in their blade.
Serina enjoyed skill. Not just in herself, but in others. It was why she had no patience for incompetence, why she surrounded herself only with those who could meet her expectations—or at least, those who could be shaped into something worthwhile.
A memory stirred. She thought back to her training in the Jedi Temple, sparring against the other Padawans. She had been ruthless—not out of malice, not even out of arrogance, but because she hated seeing wasted potential. She would cut through them with precision, faster, sharper, more calculating than her peers, and when they fell to the floor panting, defeated, angry, she had only ever thought:
Why weren't you better?
Why didn't they want it the way she did?
It frustrated her even now, thinking of those old matches, thinking of the way they had looked at her—with resentment, with suspicion, as if her discipline, her drive, was something unnatural.
And yet…
A small voice, one she rarely acknowledged, whispered: Would they have played pool with you?
She frowned, chalking the cue tip again, letting the action distract her. It was a ridiculous thought. Pointless. But it lingered, unbidden.
Would any of them have wanted to sit across from her now, not as enemies, not as rivals, but as… something else?
A companion? A friend?
The idea made her grip the cue a little tighter, as if she could physically force it out of existence. She had no time for such things. People were either assets or obstacles. That was how she had survived, how she had grown beyond the smallness of the Jedi's narrow vision, beyond the simplicity of the Sith's brutish hunger for destruction.
She created. She built.
Her fortress was proof of that.
And yet, for all its grandeur, for all its rising spires of black obsidian and halls carved with meticulous care, she was still the only one here playing pool.
Serina let out a slow breath, forcing the tension in her shoulders to ease. She took another shot, watching as the ball bounced sharply, but failed to sink. Her brows furrowed, irritation creeping back in.
A mistake. An imperfection.
She stepped back, rolling her shoulders. Perhaps she had been at this too long. Her mind was wandering, trailing into places that did not serve her.
Another sip of her drink. Another carefully measured breath.
Control.
She could not control the past. She could not control the lingering whispers of nostalgia, of what-ifs. But she could control this.
One more shot. One more victory, even in something as small as a game played alone.
She lined up the cue, inhaled, and struck.
The ball rolled smoothly, perfectly, sinking into the pocket with a soft, satisfying thunk.
She exhaled.
Order restored.
