Private Call of the Wild(er)

[Jonyna Si]

​

The past week had been rough for the Cathar. In all honesty, the past few months had. And if she was really being honest, the last 928 years had. Jonyna had never had a chance to just....breathe. To settle down and chew on what her life had become.

Thus, she took an invite to Veradune, from a jedi she had only really had the chance to meet in passing. The planet he hailed from held much more comforting than somewhere like Coruscant or even New Cov. Sprawling forests without the worry of constantly being murdered. But now she was landing in the capital, hoping to meet the jedi who had promised to meet her for console.

Vulpesen

 

[Vulpesen]

Finally relieved of the duties of Valde, having happily given the post of interim-Valde to his children, Vulpesen was finally free to greet his guests personally as they stepped off their ship on the landing platform. The reddish furred figure was instantly recognizable and Vulpesen gave Jonyna a friendly wave. At his back, the squad of armed guards, were far more formal in their greeting, standing at attention in the presence of the ex-Valde's guest.

"I'm glad you could make it, miss Si. Come on, my speeders just off the platform," he stated before turning and waving for his men to start loading up. His previous acquaintance with Jonyna on her own home planet had been fraught with conflict. Thus, he figured an initiation would be in order. He had told her that he wasn't willing to risk the lives of his men for her own anger and he doubted that such an argument would suffer from introducing her to the very people he had been professing to protect when he had made such a call.

Jonyna Si

 

[Jonyna Si]

​

Jonyna smiled. She approached the man with a relieved look, as if she really needed this. Which, to be fair, she did. She needed someone to talk to. Someone to confide in. "I take it you have somewhere you want to talk in private?"

 

[Vulpesen]

A wave of Vulpesen's hand opened the doors to the speeder and he scooted in. When riding a mount or marching, he did his own work. When it came to mechanical contraptions, he hated driving and was quite content to sit as a passenger. "A talk would be appropriate. Privacy, not necessarily." His tail swept into his lap as he looked out the window to the tall spires of his home world. "Welcome to Veradune. Until very recently, I ruled this planet. And I'm only ever one call away to my children from doing so again." His gaze turned towards the jedi. "I figured you could use a small reminder that soldiers come from somewhere."

Jonyna Si

 

[Jonyna Si]

​

Jonyna watched the city go by, the cathar seeming to have a distant look in her eyes. "I've seen soldiers plenty in my lifetime. Plenty good, plenty...bad. I always have to ask, but...I take it you know my story?"

 

[Vulpesen]

Vulpesen rose a brow at her initial statement. It was easily a subject he would have liked to have broached himself, but her question was a fair one and warranted an answer. "I read your files. I didn't garner a lot of details, and honestly I can't claim to know all the hardships you've experienced. But, I've read the histories. And I've listened to stories from those who have survived the ancient empire." He leaned back in his seat, his golden eyes catching a matching pair that peered through the rear view mirror of the enclosed vehicle. "But times have changed. Your lot in life has improved. Options are open to you and the galaxy, while no less deadly, is filled with far fewer dead ends. Tell me, of all the soldiers you've seen, how many have you spoken too? Not in ordering surrender or giving orders as a jedi general, but as a friend. As a person. As two people with different, or as with many jedi, identical jobs in this galaxy."

Jonyna Si

 

[Jonyna Si]

​

"...my friend Zash. She was a defector from the Empire. Tie ace turned rebel pilot who acted as our group's pilot. She always asked me if my hatred of the empire was justified. If I should let it go and see the Empire as just...ya know, soldiers following orders." Jonyna frowned, looking out on the city, not once looking to Vulpesen "I always told her the same thing. There's no statute of limitations on genocide. The jedi that I was told about when I was little, the ones my mom told me about, were knights. Avengers of the Oppressed. I spent a long time trying to be that in the outer rim, Hutt Space, anywhere that the Empire didn't have a grip on until I could gather enough strength to help take down the Empire too. I've never been a soldier. I could've joined the Rebels, but...I never liked the idea of having to follow orders. Too much of a Wildcat for that. I make my own decisions, based on what I wanna do. Based on my moral compass...." She paused, letting out a sigh. "Now it seems the jedi wanna tell me what to do. Tell me that I shouldn't strike first. And yet, I see history repeating itself. The GA do nothing while the Empire of the Lost is taking ground and establishing itself."

 

[Vulpesen]

"Perhaps your hatred was justified. Perhaps it wasn't. The fact remains, that empire is dead." Vulpesen offered Jonyna a raised brow as he stated, what he saw to be a simple truth. "Just as the Republic I served was not the republic that formed your empire. The Empire you knew and hated is dead. It's been dead for almost a millennium," he started before continuing on another point, "And I don't believe history is repeating itself. At least, not in the reference you're looking at. The Sideous Empire rose form the ashes of a corrupted Republic. It was like a festering disease born from a corpse. What we see now is an external threat brought about by those that believe in order over freedom." He offered a shrug as he briefly thought over the difference in philosophy. "They're wrong of course, and perhaps their methods will lead to similar crimes. But that's why we'll almost certainly end up fighting with them. And that's not why I called you here. I called you here to discuss how we'll fight them."

Golden eyes bored into Jonyna, any sense of flippancy or casualness gone. He was done talking idle philosophy and the methods and practices of long dead factions. He was a soldier, and soldier's required tactics and doctrine. That required a cold eye for details, and the full understanding of what a life and death decision meant on the battlefield. He had little doubt Jonyna knew what it meant to survive as a warrior. But now it was time to help her learn what it meant to lead in a war. "I've been doing this for almost a century. I lead companies when I was in my teens. I fought on Hapes, Denon, Geonosis, and countless other planets. I even stopped a genocide on Togoria. Your moral compass is important. But so is how you apply it."

Jonyna Si

 

[Jonyna Si]

​

That got Jonyna's attention, and her annoyance. "I fought the empire through casual terrorism, or least that's what they called it. I'm not interested in being in any armies, or fighting any wars." She paused, looking back out off the speeder, her tail flicking indignantly. "Don't talk to me like I don't know war. I lived the life of a Rebel for 10 years. Maybe I was never on the front lines, but I've taken out entire Imperial columns myself. Brought down AT-STs and Ties all the same. You don't need to act like I'm ignorant of it. I'm not. I'm just...I dunno." She let out a sigh, sounding a little deflated. "I wanna be a jedi, I really do. When I was growing up, they were the saviors of the galaxy. The Knights of the Republic. That's what I wanna be. Not whatever monk-wizard hybrid they became. And I don't wanna have to answer to any senators..." She snarled at the thought. "I'm not a politician, never will be. People smarter than I am should be doing that. People who can read the laws that they're writing. But I also don't want them to be able to stop me if I see a situation go sideways. The Empire of the Lost, Whoever the people were who showed up on Cathar, and whatever other groups are out there. They might not be the Empire I knew, but they're still invoking those symbols. Ties, Star Destroyers, the symbols of fear and terror. I don't care who their master is now, I just want to make sure those symbols die."

The Cathar paused, turning to finally look Vulpesen dead on. "I could sense it. You were mad at me back on Cathar for what I did. Even when I was standing up for my people, you questioned my methods. I wasn't looking to threaten your men's lives. That was a bluff, a threat to push that damn trooper off my planet. Because I wasn't trying to scare him, I was trying to inspire my people. We spent a thousand years living in fear, waiting for the next set of Mandos or Imps to come down and wipe us out. My people built a culture around hiding and waiting for the problem to go away. Even during the height of the republic, the Denik were reclusive because we didn't wanna invoke someone else's wrath. You don't know how hard it was growing up with that kind of generational fear. A scar that runs so deep, it's baked into your own culture. Your mythology. A story so old it's lost to time. I wanted to, for once, inspire them. Show them that we don't have to be afraid..."

 

[Vulpesen]

Vulpesen listened patiently as Jonyna spoke of her experiences. Most of it, he had only heard through histories and holocrons. Chronologically speaking, the empire had only ruled over the galaxy for about twenty years, thirty at most. Still, it was a dark time for the galaxy, something that even Veradune had marked as a significant waning of good in the galaxy.

More so than her story however, Vulpesen found he pitied her for what she wanted to be. She wanted to be a jedi, nothing more, nothing less. She didn't want politics or wars. But she also wanted a change. In these, the Wilder saw a contradiction. He had once been a jedi. In joining their ranks, he had become a soldier. He had left because he couldn't stomach the politics.

The speeder came to a stop outside of a large estate, the main building of which was bedecked with windows and arches of ever increasing extravagance. Vulpesen had done well for himself after leaving the monastic order. After stepping out from the speeder, Vulpesen walked over to open Jonyna's door, motioning for her to walk with him towards the front door.

"The order you remember and the order that existed are two very different things. The jedi were, are, and always will be soldiers. They were also politicians. The Emperor's address was issued after the jedi tried to remove him from power as a legal chancellor," he stated, raising a hand to forestall any early protests, "Now I'm not saying that he wasn't evil and that he didn't need to be removed. I'm simply saying that the jedi have always involved themselves deeply in that which you profess to want to avoid. The only reason you grew up not being a jedi under the senate is because the senate had been dissolved, and you weren't actually a jedi. You were an outlaw with a lightsaber, the force, and no order to report to."

Behind them, the transports arrived and the squad of guards jumped out to follow after them, even the driver of Vulpesen's own Speeder moving up to walk at Jonyna's side. "As for your attempt at a bluff, and your desire to show that there was no need to fear the empire," he leaned forward, fixing his gaze on the driver to Jonyna's right. "Yularis, what would be your view of anyone who faced down an orbiting star destroyer with a platoon of ground troops and called themselves fearless?"

"They'd be an idiot, sir."

Vulpesen nodded and resumed his attention to Jonyna. "Fear is not something to be ashamed of. Its natural, and the Empire used it to great effect. But fear can be turned into other things. Hatred. Hope. Fury. Jonyna, I was angry with you because your bluff, if called as any reasonable commander would do, would lead to the deaths of myself, you, my men, and perhaps that entire village. As for your assertions that me or my people don't know that fear of destruction," this time he turned back towards the soldiers behind him. "Captain? Where were you before the battle of Zorros?"

"Hiding in a cave, sir, with your father. Bandits took my home. Killed my kin. Hunted us into the mountains before we got the call to resistance."

"How long were you hiding?"

"Four hundred years, sir. Four hundred years we were hunted like animals."

Jonyna Si

 

[Jonyna Si]

​

The Cathar stared back, unimpressed and now very annoyed. "Are you always this tackless or are you just going around calling everyone an idiot to their face? Yes, I'm aware the jedi of my time weren't what I had been told. My old boyfriend Giran was more than happy to tell me how much I believed about the jedi was wrong. And I've taken down Star Destroyers with less. You don't need to talk to me like I'm a fool. I know I didn't have the forces to hold off the entire Imp force, but that's why it was a bluff. Between me, Val, and You, I figured that was enough to scare off the Imps and make them leave. You undermined that by compromising with the fascists..."

Her tone was sounding more and more on edge, something she very much didn't need right now. She thought this guy was inviting her to help her unwind, not critique her for past choices. Maybe she could leave and go back to the Coruscant....

Vulpesen

 

[Vulpesen]

"Only when they're ordering me t-" Yularis cut himself off at a raised hand from Vulpesen who took Jonyna's argument with a serene expression, accented by a single raised brow.

"You'll have to forgive my officers. They're from my royal guard, and follow me into all combat operations, including Cathar. What concerns us is when that bluff fails. I've seen it happen. I got lucky. But luck fails easily against star destroyers." He took a deep breath and opened the doors to his home, showing a large foyer, the right side of which opened into into a large dining room with a massive table stacked with plates. "But we can talk about that later. For now, lets eat. I'm sure you've had a long journey and I admit this conversation is a bit more trying than I intended."

Stepping out from the dining hall was a trio of zorren adults. Two of them, a youthful man and woman, lacked the tails that swayed among all the others, but their stark white hair marked them easily as siblings. The white haired pair seemed to be a bit younger than Jonyna, but then again, so did Vulpesen. The third of the trio, held an easy air of authority and despite a stronger jaw and more rugged features, shared more than a few similarities with Arch Wilder. "This must be the guest you spoke of. A pleasure to meet you miss, I'm Garren. Garren Torrevaso, patriarch of House Torrevaso."

"Vallen Torrevaso, acting Valde of Veradune," the young man staed with a slight nod.
"Daella Torrevaso, acting Valdess of Veradune," the young woman followed.

Jonyna Si

 

[Jonyna Si]

​

Jonyna raised an eyebrow, looking to the two. "So you're like....chiefs?" Jonyna looked incredibly confused.

The concept of royalty was a foreign one to her. Not only was monarchy most certainly not a thing on Cathar, but the Denik didn't even technically have leaders. The elders were the leaders, and anyone who lived that long was looked to not as a person of authority, but of wisdom. Cathar had not had wars in centuries, nor formal government. The chiefdom was a tribunal that almost never met, only on occasions that required some sort of punitive decision, or a change to the cathar's way of life.

For now at least, she was willing to put aside the conversation from before. She knew she was fighting uphill in a place like this. On Cathar, she'd have the popular support. But here, she was convincing people who were against her to begin with. It could be done, but she wasn't here to do that. She was here to make nice and relax, if that was possible for her...

Vulpesen

 

[Vulpesen]

The twins offered a shrug with identical timing before Daella spoke up, "Of a sort. Dad there, was the Valde before us, but he decided to go off and take a bit of a vacation. He left us in charge until he decides to come back, or the people of Veradune decide to hold an election. Now come on, we're starving and we can talk about it while we eat." She offered the cathar and her father a cheeky smile before turning back to the dining room to find a seat, Vallen following shortly behind her.

"I think my grand daughter has the right of it. And son, try not to start a fight at dinner, this isn't the fox," Garren said with a word of warning, his ears flicking to show that he had heard the argument at the threshold. Vulpesen had earned the right to rulership on Veradune by virtue of his deeds. Garren had earned it centuries before in a time when political maneuvering and an abundance of tact had been a bit more necessary.

Vulpesen in response to the rebuke, simply rolled his eyes, his lips none the less holding a smile of acquiescence as he motioned Jonyna forward. "Go on and sit where you like. I'd advise near the center if you've questions to ask. That's the place for people that wish to spend dinner in conversation."

Jonyna Si

 

[Jonyna Si]

​

Jonyna looked a little incredulous at the thought, pausing to look to the massive table. "...how many people live here?" She asked, sitting in the middle of the table. "You talk like the people on this planet are content to be ruled by a single family..."

 

[Vulpesen]

Vulpesen thought for a moment at her question, his eyes roaming over the table as he went to take a seat at the middle of it all. "Six members of the household, with rooms for probably about another thirty." He reached over to the center of the table, placing a pile of food up on his plate. Around the table was an array of men and women in military dress that had joined Vulpesen, Joyna, and the three additional Torrevasos.

"And Veradune is ruled by a Valde. We are elected into power, though the council of Excelsi can always call for a new vote to depose us." Smiles grew along the lips of his children and they both gave a small shake of their head. "I think its safe to say that my rule, however, is secured for the forseeable future."

One gruff fellow, a face scarred by war and one of the oldest looking at the table at the human equivalent of thirty, spoke up. "Its hard to vote against the man who gave you back your home. Even harder when he then follows it up by bringing your loved ones back from the dead."

"I ruled before Vulpesen. So when he decided to step down to visit your Galactic Alliance, noone argued when we kept to the family tradition and he named his children as regents," Garren added, elaborating as to how the twins had held onto power earned by their father's achievements.

Jonyna Si

 

[Jonyna Si]

​

Jonyna raised an eyebrow, shifting in her seat. "Heroic actions don't always translate to a talent for politics. I should know. I hate politics. But you seem to be good at it..."

 

[Vulpesen]

Garren and a few of the officers at the table almost choked on their food, covering their mouths as they did their best to stifle their laughter. Vulpesen, in return offered them a glare, something that caused most of the officers to sober up, though his father and the elder soldier from earlier still kept smiles plastered on their faces. "Hardly. The man's chair in the Howlaw court has so many claw marks, you might think its part of the decor."

"What Excelsius Harlow means," Vulpesen growled, doing nothing to remove the man's mirth, "Is that the Valde is largely a figurehead position. I break ties and approve bills set forth by the Howlaw court, our actual diplomatic branch. I ensure a balance between the council of Excelsi and Magni who lead the different branches of our government and ensure that the will of the people is followed."

The elder soldier, lifted himself up from his chair, offering Jonyna a polite nod. "Excelsius Corren Harlow, formerly of the Valde's Royal Guard, and currently head of the Armis Militia," he said, properly introducing himself before popping a hunk of meat into his mouth. "Its my boys that were with you on Cathar. Trident company of the Royal Regiment." He waved to the other men and women who had yet to be introduced. "These fine men and women are their officers. Each one was there when you and Fox-face decided to take on a star destroyer's worth of Imperials."

Jonyna Si

 

[Jonyna Si]

​

Jonyna stared across the table, shifting in her seat to sit a little taller at the mention of what happened on Cathar again. "I'm not going to go through trying to argue my position again. I stand by my actions. You can talk all you want about your men, but you didn't grow up in a world where being afraid and hiding from the problem was your culture's default reaction since long before you were born."

 

[Vulpesen]

A stillness fell over the table as sudden as it was absolute. Jonyna found herself stared down by almost two dozen faces, blank with incredulity, and in some cases, anger. Vulpesen for his part, simply ate his food, his eyes moving about the officers as he gauged their reaction. It was several heartbeats of tenseness until Harlow finally broke the silence. “She doesn’t know.” His voice, previously loud and commanding, was now little more than a whisper, a note of understanding ringing through it to ease any signs of rage at the table.

The officers blinked in surprise and turned to Garren who heaved a small sigh. “Miss Jonyna, I believe there’s a bit of history to be learned. It's true that we don’t have a long lived cultural fear of destruction. It hasn’t been bred into us by some wrong done four or five millennia ago. No, our sense of preservation comes from something more… immediate. It was the first task that my son completed to become Valde.”

Vulpesen swallowed his food and spoke. “When I found Veraudne, it was in ruins. Bandits, salvers, murderers, and tyrants had descended on the planet four centuries before I arrived. They murdered and ransacked their way into rulership of the planet. The Zorrens were ousted and hunted. That’s the Veradune I healed. My father however, didn’t grow up on tales of oppression. He and the others survived it.”

“If you hid with me in the caverns and wilds, raise your hand.” Half of the officers, including Harlow raised their hands then lowered them. “If you hid in the darkest corners of the galaxy, hoping you wouldn’t be found, raise your hand.” Another third obeyed. “If you watched your loved ones slaughtered, your families destroyed, and your friends murdered,” He didn’t even finish before the first hands rose. Eventually, every hand raised to the query. He waited for a moment for the hands to fall back down. “If you yourself died, raise your hand.” Three hands raised and the officers, two men and a woman, looked to catch Jonyna’s eye. “Jedi Jonyna, you’re talking of crimes suffered by your ancestors. Vulpesen’s grandfather died fighting imperials to wipe our planet from their vision, and that was before the plague hit. Everyone here except for him and his children have been hunted like animals in their own lifetimes.” His voice was low and calm, free from the judgment held by his son and the Excelsis. Still, it held a tone of sincerity and pleading. “What Vulpesen and Harlow have been trying to tell you, miss, no matter how harshly, is that no one understands more than we do.”


Jonyna Si