Private Birds of a Feather

[Kai Bamarri]

Since coming to Coruscant, Kai had just barely scratched the surface of the underworld. Now that they were this deep in the city’s bowels, he took in the sights, sounds, and smells with wide eyes. Poisons in the air, the byproducts of factories and pollution belched out of machinery, caused Damsy to cough and cover her mouth and nose. Kai hardly found the noxious fumes pleasant, but he wasn’t bothered by them in the same way. A fine mist seemed to drift out of his pores, the toxins passing harmlessly out of his body.

<Do you remember how to get there?>

She seemed a bit unsure, making her way there based on her memory, and it had apparently been some time since she last visited this place. He didn’t think she would lead them astray; indeed, Damsy seemed like the sort of person who couldn’t ever truly lose her way, unless she wanted to get lost.

Not long after he posted the question, a tingling sensation spread across the back of his neck, along with it an impulse to turn and look backwards. He threw a glance over his shoulder without slowing his walking pace. Nothing. So why did he feel like they were being watched, if not followed?

Damsy Callat​

 

[Damsy Callat]

She missed the glance over his shoulder, too preoccupied by taking in her own surroundings. "Sure do," she muttered through the thick fabric. "It should be just up here."

And it was: a rusted-over elevator behind a wire fence. The lines were thick but also corroded. Some sections were all but fallen apart, drooping down under their own dead weight. In fact, there was an average-person-sized gap in the mesh closest to the ground, but it looked as if it had been purposefully rent rather than torn by natural wear and tear. Damsy bent and scrambled through. "My handiwork. We in the right place now," she said to further convince Kai.

Once stood up again, she approached the large, double elevator doors and rapped on them with first her knuckles then an open palm. Hollowness rung out. She dragged the latter over one door until she found its narrow junction with the other. Then she dug her fingers into the gap and...

...tried to tug.

Nothing budged.

Kai Bamarri

 

[Kai Bamarri]

Kai slid easily through the person-sized hole, emerging on the other side just behind Damsy. He stuck close to her as she approached the rusty elevator, still occasionally glancing backwards, but his attention was soon seized by her struggle to open the doors.

Without saying even a telepathic word, he reached over her head with both arms and jammed his fingers into the crack. He widened the gap by pushing more of his malleable flesh inside, then with a flex of muscles, he exerted Wookiee-level strength upon the doors, forcing them open with a scream of rusted metal scraping violently against each other.

Stepping backwards, he didn’t seem in the least bit strained by the effort. He looked at Damsy expectantly.

Damsy Callat​

 

[Damsy Callat]

She just rose her brows at him, impressed.

The elevator was not in the shaft. Well, it was, but not at this level. It was instead of few stops down, at the bottom of its relatively short track. A glance into the empty tube would confirm that. Though she knew this, Damsy inched to the edge and looked first up and then down. Making sure, perhaps? An abundance of caution rarely killed anyone. "I can climb if you need a rest," she suggested.

Kai Bamarri

 

[Kai Bamarri]

Kai also peered into the shaft, then glanced at Damsy.

<Up or down?>

He didn’t need a rest, but he wanted to see how she would climb.

Damsy Callat​

 

[Damsy Callat]

"Hella down," she replied, though it was only probably three-four floors. Nice to twelve metres. She knelt then sat on the ledge. "Watch yourself; this is kindda tricky." Despite having done this very thing years ago, she still remembered the steps perfectly -- like she had descended this same shaft just yesterday:

Find a foothold in the exposed electronic below to turn herself around. Dangle off the top floor by both hands. Swing her feet and let go on the inswing. Let the momentum carry her into the threshold a level down. The ledge went nowhere, door rusted shut like the one Kai had wrenched open, but there was still enough space to stand for a moment. Repeat until she was at the end of the line.

She looked up to Kai. "Your turn, kid."

Kai Bamarri

 

[Kai Bamarri]

He watched her monkey her way down, then cocked his head to the side as she bid him follow. The ledge held his weight as he promptly dangled from it, dropped down to the next, then the third.

On the final ledge, he swung down, landing in a crouch. His flesh rippled faintly, body hardening as he absorbed the impact. Completely unharmed and unafraid.

Wherever Damsy went from there, he followed.

Damsy Callat​

 

[Damsy Callat]

"Good deal. Lessgo."

Damsy led the way the only wat that there was to go besides back up: into the belly of the Works. It wasn't a long hallway than they walked down before coming into a much larger warehouse-like room. Huge, open blast doors ushered into another a dozen meters on and down a slight grade. The floor was a patchwork of solid walkways and industrial mesh grates that either let off steam or filtered water being poured into them by pipes above as they switched on. Whatever was in the water and/or steam, though both were generally translucent, it was to be assumed that the smell was generated here. Worse fumes permeated the closer they got, causing Damsy's eyes to water fresh.

Noisy, too, between the periodic downpours, settling of various metals, and powering-on and -offs of machineries, but otherwise seeming lonely. No obvious signs of life excepting present company. No obvious signs of upkeep either -- the whole place was holding together, fulfilling its purpose, but either no one had come this way for means of maintenance or indeed they hadn't managed their job.

"Was the dig of some domestic terror getup when I was here last," she explained as she and Kai walked on down the ramp, voice a little raised to overcome the gush of water. "Long gone. Doubt they dead; I put 'em away with a Jedi back then too. But doubt even more they'd sell us out if they ever came to know we set up shop here."

She came to stop on the threshold, and grabbed for her trident. "Still, we probably should do a sweep of the area." A shake of the handle, as always, extended the staff. The electricity stayed turned off for now. "Watch my back."

It was almost a question.

Ninety percent of the room turned out to be clear; she had to literally bite her lip to keep from calling it out. But as she rounded the corner the check the last location, a weight sideswiped her at full speed. She saw nothing but the rapidly-approaching wall as she flew into it. Then behind-of-eyelid black. Then crimson on the steely-grey flooring. Kai would have seen claws though.

Kai Bamarri

 

[Kai Bamarri]

Kai’s eyes widened as his body burst out in sudden shudders, every nerve screaming danger.

<Watch ou—!>

Too late. Damsy was sent flying across the room, claws scratching in the spot where she had once stood. Kai turned toward the ogre, his body tense and feet splayed apart. The thing growled and drooled, gibbering and babbling as it lumbered toward him.

Kai’s eyes went wide, his shoulders hunched up. Fear catapulted him into the beast’s mind, clawing at its subconscious like a stray cat. Stopped in its tracks, the mutated creature whined and whimpered, clutching its head with huge veiny hands, each thick knobby finger tipped with a sharp claw.

Kai was losing control, but not of the ogre. He was losing control of himself. The temptation he had narrowly avoided with Damsy earlier that day was virtually impossible to resist now. And what of it, anyway? This thing wasn’t sentient. It reminded him of how he had been in the wilderness on Dahrtag. A monster with the brain of an infant. No, it wasn’t so bad to feed on this thing...

The ogre curled inward, its claws digging into the soft flesh of its temples, drawing blood as the pain and fuzziness in its mind increased. Kai’s back arched, throat exposed, the muscles within working strangely, as though he were gulping down something. And then… the ogre stopped mewling. It lay slumped on the floor—still drooling, still a great big lumbering monstrosity. Still alive. But it had gone silent and still, its head emptied of consciousness.

Kai didn’t need to breathe, or else he might have gasped as he straightened. Instead, he was as quiet as the ogre. For a moment he looked as if he didn't know where he was, then it all came rushing back. Damsy.

<Are you okay?>

Damsy Callat​

 

[Damsy Callat]

A long groan snaked its way up and out of her throat as she pushed herself off the floor. "All considered, think so." She sat back on her heels, swept her braids from her face, and glanced around the room. Somewhat out of reach, her trident began to shake and then gravitated into her barely extended palm. Exceedingly good thing she hadn't had had the electricity going, or she might have shocked herself pretty good.

"Guess you are too." She meant Kai though her eyes settled on the collapsed pile of ogre. "It gon just stay there?"

Kai Bamarri

 

[Kai Bamarri]

Kai’s gaze followed hers back to the body, then quickly looked away.

<It won’t move again.>

If that was the case, it would die here slowly of starvation, or fall prey to the other creatures that lived down here. Kai may have consumed its mind, but it wasn’t a good thing to leave something alive in such a state, was it?

Turning away from Damsy, he approached the ogre once more, crouching beside where it had fallen. One hand grew sharp and hard, the fingers fusing together into a blade, and with a single downward swing of his arm, he removed the ogre’s head from its shoulders.

Kai stood up again, his hand reforming, scattering droplets of blood.

<Let’s go.>

Damsy Callat​

 

[Damsy Callat]

Damsy had to look away at the moment of truth. She busied herself with standing up with aid of her trident. Something about straight-up execution had always made her queasy.

"Right, well," she began, turning away so she wouldn't accidently look. She felt a kick -- or rather a tail flick -- in the pit of her stomach. "It looks good down here. Safe now, thanks to you.

"'Suppose we can leave. The Jedi might be missin' us."

They'd be bad guests to keep their hosts waiting.

Kai Bamarri

 

[Kai Bamarri]

<Safe?>

Kai cast a searching look in Damsy’s direction, then around the room. For some reason, he hadn’t realized that this was their destination until now.

<This is where you want us to go… if the Jedi ever turn bad?>

It was an odd way of phrasing a potential betrayal of trust, but strangely accurate. Kai didn’t want to leave the Jedi Temple just yet, but if he had no choice, he supposed he could live down here.

<Okay.>

He reached down to help her to her feet.

Damsy Callat​

 

[Damsy Callat]

<. . . if the Jedi ever turn bad?>

Biting her lip and nodding suddenly sheepish, Damsy assented. Force, she really hope they never did. But, it had never been a bad idea for her to formulate a backup plan, from the lone tracking of prey through a flooded cave system on Kamino to holding out with a squad under enemy fire until local backup could arrive on Copperline. The only thing that bit her in the tail in those few situations she hadn't was improvising.

She took his hand. "This won't be the first place they think to check," she added. "I can almos' promise that. But if things really do turn that sour, we can plan next moves from here." She didn't aspire to living the rest of her life in a near-literal sewer and not just because she had gotten to know a better quality of living, but because the symbolism would be a little on the nose.

"We best get these things," she held out her trident, apparently meaning her weapons, "back to my place. Don't wanna clue Dag into...well, much o' anything, really."

Kai Bamarri

 

[Kai Bamarri]

Kai scratched his head. It wasn’t as if he was a stranger to things going south, but the Jedi… he had made friends among them. Aeris, Damsy, Dagon. There were files on him, reports written up and papers stamped that said he was under the New Jedi Order’s protection. Would they really forfeit it all, after everything?

The answer was a whimpered yes.

The mention of weapons snapped him out of his thoughts, breaking his mile-long stare into the abyss. He reached inside himself and pulled out the dart gun to show it was fully intact, then tucked it away again somewhere in his side.

<Yeah, we should get back.>

He headed up back through the elevator shaft, with Damsy presumably close behind. Though he didn’t mention it, he wanted to come back to this place soon. The taste of the ogre was still on his mind. No doubt more would come so long as it remained abandoned...

Damsy Callat​

 

[Damsy Callat]

**

Having left her weapons safely tucked away exactly where they had been in her shabby apartment and now returning back into the Temple through a not-frequented entrance, Damsy paused on the threshold. She glanced at Kai. "I...uh," she began, throat stopped up with all the melancholy that had finally caught up to her, been falling behind them as they flew through the Coruscanti air once again.

I don't want to leave you, was the bubbling sentiment she didn't let pop, but not because she didn't want him to know. Because she wasn't ready to be that vulnerable. To admit to herself, in spoke word, that she was forming a family. Chosen or blood, what was that good for? A ripe situation for advantage-taking power-dynamics, an exchange that had always stuck her with the shorter straw.

Instead, she said, "...dunno when we'll see each other again. But we ought have a way to let the other know we're in trouble. Just, y'know, in case..."

That insinuation doubled down to hang even heavier in the air.

Kai Bamarri

 

[Kai Bamarri]

Damsy seemed to be having trouble finding the right words to say. Kai waited patiently for her to figure it out, then tilted his head to the side when she finally did speak.

<I don’t have a comm or access to the Holonet. So I don’t have any contact information to give you.>

Aside from telepathic bonds, he knew of no other practical method of staying in touch. To that end, he focused on her and opened himself. Whether her mind would also open and let him establish a mild connection, he left it up to her.

If she did, she would see clearly what sort of being he was beneath the Sithspawn shell that had been imposed on him—though it was difficult to describe a Bamarri to one who has not experienced them for themselves. There was a semblance of the white lightning that had quickened him to life, and the iridescent marble which had given him form, and a number of other strange substances at play in the perfect storm which had created him. He was not human, not even mortal, not even of this universe, perhaps. But he had nothing to hide and meant her no harm.

Damsy Callat​

 

[Damsy Callat]

For a moment after his saying so, she pursed her lips in palatable disappointment. Not in him but in the reality of 'huh, just how are we gonna make this work?' But then she felt something in her aura -- similar to the reaching out that Dagon always did. To Kai, though, it the decision to reciprocate came much easier:

She opened her mind to his.

Oh.

She was surprised in a delusional sort of way for but a moment that Kai wasn't actually the likeness of their mutual acquaintance. Warden? Friend? In any case, the feeling subsided quickly. Nothing of a sort like fear rose in its place, but instead a kind of wonder. She had indeed never experienced a Bamarri before. Something told her she never would after Kai again.

<Oh,> she repeated, words telepathic but formed still by silent lips. She hadn't practiced this nearly enough. Kind of ridiculous, considering how long she had been dabbling in Force training virtually all over the galaxy. <Hi there.> A smile in the physical plane accompanied a somewhat dimmed ray of light in the etheric.

Yeah, this'd do.

Kai Bamarri