Private Benediction: After The Ashes

[Briana Sal-Soren]

B E N E D I C T I O N : A F T E R T H E A S H E S
[ Past Thread / Directly Following The Devastation of Naboo ]​

Themes: The Last Butterfly
Tag: Vizion Trozky

“There is no crueler torment, than to see an end coming as clear as morning and be powerless to prevent it.”





It had all started that day.​

Briana woke from the latest sleep cycle, having been in that heavy sort of slumber in which she’d briefly forgotten her surroundings. Face buried deeply into the pillow supporting her and briefly, she thought she could smell something - the familiar scent of five blossom bread. That special sweet bread she loved so much that her father would order the servants to make it each year around her birthday. Her stomach rumbled at the thought, drowsily worried that if she didn’t hurry and get out of bed, one of her siblings might beat her to the kitchen and eat it all. Specifically Brandyn - bottomless pit that he was.

With a stretch, she rolled from her pile of blankets and finally fluttered open her eyes, vision adjusting to the dim, cold lighting of the room.

That’s when it all began coming back to her, and Briana felt an empty ache seep in through her skin. How quickly her mind switched from the warm, comforting thoughts of home, to remembering all of the pain that was the reality of this new existence. An acute awareness that expanded exponentially into the infinite cosmos.

In the blink of an eye, she’d watched her homeworld become a sea of carnage and misery. A moment that now that she was awake, she could not stop reliving. The screams, the vaporization, over and over again on an endless looping cycle, it was -

The door to her room slid open, Vizion standing there in the door frame. Her oldest, dearest friend. For the briefest of seconds, though, her brow furrowed, trying to place what happened. Memories of the last moments on Naboo filtered in, getting separated from Valery, finding Vizion, their near-death escape together.

She swung her legs over the bed, white-knuckle gripping the edge of it. “I…” she pressed her lips together tightly to keep them from quivering, her heart like a heavy, constricting weight inside her chest. “It’s all gone, Viz.” the words barely eked out, as if vocalizing it would attest to its truth. Naboo had been the last piece of her childhood, her comfort, her heart. A way to still pretend the Galaxy wasn't as terrifying a place as it could seem.

That chapter of her life was now permanently closed. Gone in the blink of an eye.

Lost forever.

 

[Vizion Trozky]

LOCATION: Aboard the Rising Star
TIME: Unknown
THEME: To Find a Reason - Hyolyn
TAGS: Briana Sal-Soren

He'd been up before her checking the autonav, getting the caf going, sorting out a simple meal - the very five-blossom bread that wafted into her dreamscape factoring into it - after his own hard-won sleep. He was standing over the toaster oven when he started to hear her movement, with the egg timer still having half of its time remaining, and the bread being ready at about the same time; he was no real cook but he could manage, enough that he could afford to walk away to find her door, to reach for the chime, only for the door to open as soon as he got close enough.

No lock set…?

His gaze turned slowly from the panel to the inside of the room, and he froze. He had been expecting a handful more of seconds to steel himself, but his eyes affixed on her, the tenseness of her body telling him what it could until her words broke the spell, and finished the supposition for him. His arm dropped, wearily, defeated, his chin going almost in the same direction, averting his eyes. It hurt to look on her with that truth in the air.

"I…" His thoughts darkened with sorrow, his lean on the doorframe becoming heavier, I know. I was there. I saw it all burn with my own two eyes. It was my home too! but he didn't need to tell her that. She knew. His hand came back up, covering his eyes for some moments, slow breaths making the shallow rise and fall of his chest until his head rose, his hand slipped away, and he forced himself to look again on the face of his oldest, dearest friend, she who was holding a dam against what would surely come: her tears... he had seen them, soothed them so many times over his life, but the current of pain, here and now, gave him no real recourse, no balm for her hurt because it gripped him as well. Her pain, and his, and he fought to put the lid on its surge in himself, barely succeeding, "...there's…" he swallowed, licked his lips, feeling dry, "...there's caf, and the eggs and toast are almost ready."

There were no, and there could be no jokes for this. Even if it were right to, he was bereft of any humour.... but at the very least he could take care of her. He always had, one way or another. He pushed off the doorframe, on the precipice of the cavernous ache, and reached out to her with one hand, "Come here."

 

[Briana Sal-Soren]

Themes: XoXo
Tag: Vizion Trozky

Her bottom lip quivered as he spoke, hearing that subtle crack in his voice. Her own eyes reddened and watered but Briana refused to cry in front of him, clenching her jaw tightly and swallowing down the tight lump that'd formed in her throat. Although Viz had always been her comforter and the only person she ever allowed to see her tear-ridden self, truly knowing her better than anyone else, this felt different. Some part of her had hoped he would tell her it'd been a dream, that it was a nightmare, a mistake. Instead, he talked of breakfast like it was the most normal thing in the Galaxy, and the calm way in which he spoke some how made it worse. Nothing would ever be 'normal' again. Perhaps there would be moments of normality that would ebb and flow throughout both of their lives, but she knew that neither of them would ever go back to feeling completely whole again. That thought filled her with grief, grief for the both of them, for the dreams they'd shared and the dreams they'd lost.

An even more disturbing thought then entered her mind: how could she have prevented all of this, if she'd only acted sooner? The vision of Naboo's destruction had come to her almost a month before, but she'd kept it to herself. How many lives might have been saved if she'd gone to Naboo before those creatures descended on them? She'd let herself be talked down from the edge, only to have those fears be reignited after Viz confirmed similar premonitions from Emir Sato-Viren. But by then, it had been too late. Because of her inaction, Naboo was now a wasteland.

"Come here."

Briana finally looked up, really seeing him now. Perhaps it was the lighting of the ship, but he looked so pale and tired, like he carried the weight of the Galaxy on his shoulders. Nothing like the carefree boy she'd grown up with... it hurt to think that she may have been partially responsible for that change. Inhaling deeply and fighting against the desire to crawl back under the sheets and stay there for the rest of the day, her feet moved as bidden, pulling her from the ocean of despair that threatened to drown her.

Crossing to his side, Briana's elegant fingers slipped between his. A part of her wanted to bury herself into his chest, swing her arms around his neck and let the water gates flood open, but instead she kept the pressure valve on her emotional control in tact. "What do we do now, Viz?" she asked softly.