Private Elevated Episodes: How I Met Your Mother - Jungle Rehash

[Aver Brand]

Des answered in her stead before Aver could even think of a proper response, so she simply shrugged a shoulder and tipped her head at her mate.

She reached for the whisky when the conversation moved onto the vastness of the Shamalain family tree.

Repeatedly.

“Your house,” Aver said, smirking into her drink. “I’m only allowed to make suggestions,” she stage-whispered to her mother with a conspiratorial wink, “and she’s very particular about technology. And other modern inventions. Like, you know… heat, plumbing, electricity…”

Her ribbing devolved into a snort as she avoided Qui’s gaze and absconded into the kitchen with their empty plates.

It was, finally, time for the main course. Which is to say, steak.

Aver lurked behind the island only so long as it took to put a good sear on one of them – the happily married couple, after all, were going to enjoy their meat raw and bloody.

Not quite gnawing on marrow, but there was only so much space on the curtailed dinner menu.

 

[Quietus]

Lenda was clearly enjoying the rapport between the two women, a small smile playing quietly on her face as she listened to their banter. It broadened at Aver's whisper and wink, and her gaze followed after her as she left the table.

"Were you..." Lenda trailed off as she searched for the appropriate words, "not a child of luxury or technology?" her curious gaze shifted to Des.

"On the contrary," Des replied, "I was raised within a very wealthy family and, for the most part, I wanted for very little. My upbringing was polar opposite to Aver's and where I was, arguably, blessed with a peaceful childhood I was not necessarily wanted. My parents were rarely together and my mother resented me for how much I took after my father. She decided early on in my adolescence that I was incorrigible and shipped me off to Onderon where I was left to be raised by the beast tribes in the jungles."

Lenda blinked, "Jungles?"

"Oh yes, and I wasn't wanted there, either. I was foisted from caretaker to caretaker until I ended up with a shamed elder woman named Silverclaw. Her only hope to be granted welcome back with her family was to teach me their ways. She was awful, of course, and our hate was mutual, but she did teach me quite a lot. It was with her I was named Blackthorne."

"Your ... tribal name then?" Lenda glanced up as Aver served out the slabs of meat, her brows raising at the amount set before her. She was a smaller woman than Aver by a good deal and was already beginning to feel full.

"I was a thorn in the side of everyone I met and - well I looked quite a bit different then. I had black hair."

"The silver is nice though. Is it natural?" Lenda cut her serving in half, eyeballed each side and went with the smaller half to cut into pieces.

"It ... is. Yes. I guess I'm finally starting to show my age now."

"So you grew up in the jungles without the luxuries of technology?"

"For the most part. When I was twelve I was discovered by the local ruling Sith Lord Daritha. He took an interest in my force presence and I became his protege. I lived and trained with him and his wife, Lady Sullen, for many years before my father decided I was worthy of his attention and ... took me back. From there I spent the formative years of my young adulthood being passed between various Sith families before I was nominated to Masterhood as one of the youngest in the order. After that I was given much more freedom, and I chose to return to Onderon where I made my seat of power. All this to say, I am quite comfortable with living off the land. I may not make use of much technology given the choice, but my home is not without its own unique luxuries." Des chewed on a bit of steak, looking over at Aver with consideration, "Alas, happy wife - happy life. Isn't that what they say. So the new house will incorporate Aver's luxuries with my own."

 

[Aver Brand]

The low sound she made in the back of her throat was positively rapacious as Aver sat down with her sirloin. If Lenda surveyed her plate with trepidation, her daughter reserved only delight and hunger for her own slab of meat – and it was almost twice again as large as what she’d served their guest.

You’d think she was a week starved, the way she dove into her plate, but Aver was just being Aver – enthusiastic and entirely unsubtle.

The story Qui regaled over steak and root purée wasn’t an unfamiliar one, so she focused more on Lenda’s reaction than the words themselves.

Well, what little of it that wasn’t devoted to her enjoyment of steak.

That last line, though – eyeroll.

Aver set her utensils aside and kicked back with her glass, wriggling only a little to avoid her belt digging in.

“And I’ve had to fight for every last one of them,” she added with a pointed sip, brows lofting as if to prevent a clever quip.

Also – she glanced at her mother, then down at the as-yet-untouched half of her steak – “Are you gonna eat that?”

 

[Quietus]

"There are just some things a tree house doesn't need," Des replied lightly, watching Aver devour her food with mild amusement.

30 years and I still can't get you to chew your food...

She smirked.

"Tree-treehouse?" Lenda looked up distractedly at Aver's sudden interest in her food. My but the woman ate fast. "Ahm - " she blinked and looked down at the other half of her steak, "I'm actually getting a bit full so, no, probably not." Lenda looked at her and somehow instantly knew what the next action should be. She hanked her fork into the meat and leaned to place it on Aver's plate. "I'm sure you need all the protein you can get. I don't do much heavy lifting, myself."

"I think she keeps the local rare meat trade in business all on her own," Des remarked. Sharing food, or sometimes in Aver's case stealing food from one another's plate was par for normal. At least in those 30 years she had learned to ask politely instead of just swiping.

"Tell me, did I hear you right? Tree-house?" Lenda cleared her throat and took a drink of wine for good measure as she sat down again.

 

[Aver Brand]

I chew just fine. Not my problem y’all are all slow as fuck.

Aver snorted, her quiet amusement at Qui’s sass turning into a broad grin when Lenda did a double-take. Not that it lasted particularly long – her focus turned razor-sharp as her forlorn plate was once more replete with steak.

If it weren’t for her brickly nature, one might even suspect Aver of having planned for a surfeit of sirloin. But that would, of course, require cunning.

She stabbed her fork into the meat with a broad grin and snapped her pointed teeth shut on the morsel with disturbing delight.

Aver? Cunning?

She hardly knew ‘er.

“Tree-palace, more like,” she answered between bites, all the while dicing the meat into even little cubes. Like maybe she was proving a point out of spite to someone in particular.

Aver? Spiteful?

She har— “and technically the reason for this dinner, actually.” Arching a brow at Qui, Aver popped another forkful into her mouth. “Des grew the tree from a seed to a house in, what, three months?”

Smirk.

“Teach me to doubt her.”

 

[Quietus]

"One."

Lenda was following the conversation with some difficulty. The reposte was quick between them, as if they were nearly of the same train of thought, same mind. It was eerie in a strangely endearing sort of way.

"One?" Lenda asked, forgetting she still have food on her plate.

"One month," Des replied.

"Forgive me but ... how?"

That droll, mischievous smile implanted itself onto Quietus' lips so easily it might as well have been a permanent fixture, "Really good fertilizer."

Lenda narrowed her gaze in a look of skepticism that would be right at home on Aver's face as well.

Qui chuckled, "I have a certain affinity with the powers of nature and beasts. I can ... funnel energies into seeds, empowering them to grow at unnatural speeds and in the case of my treehomes, in a size and structure to fit my uses."

"So you..." Lenda's brows furrowed in thought, "are a shaper?"

"...yes, you could put it that way. How do you know about shapers?"

"Late night holodramas, mostly."

 

[Aver Brand]

“One month,” Aver mouthed with a fond eyeroll directed at nobody in particular and mopped up the final dregs of Lenda’s steak.

Her brows did a little spirited dance at the mention of shapers. Pushing her plate aside, Aver leaned forward on her elbows and directed an incredulous gaze at her mother.

“There’s holodramas about the Yuuzhan Vong?”

 

[Quietus]

"Of course there are," Lenda waved a hand lazily, "haven't you gals ever tuned in to Vollywood HV after a double shift, cracked open a cold one, reheated a pizza and just vegged on the couch for five episodes of Master Mayhem? Honestly, you haven't lived." The woman picked up her wine glass, smirking into her sip. She knew the joke - she was the naive one at the table.

"Mm, there was a love-triangle series called Dr. Kro and the main protagonist was a Shaper of Kro Var trying to recover lost Kro Var artifacts by disguising himself. What a hunk."

 

[Aver Brand]

Lenda happily answered her question.

Perhaps even a little… too happily.

Aver’s smirk fell.

From its remains twisted a growing expression of horror as her mother went on to elaborate on the highlights of late-night hv of the Outer rim.

“A love-triangle?” she parroted on a whisper, as if raising her voice to speaking volume would break what little composure she retained.

“I—,” Aver smacked her lips, took a sip of Whyren’s, and shook her head, “—can’t say I watch hv.”

She blinked, frowning in thought.

“Ever.”

 

[Quietus]

"I watch it back at my flat on Coruscant," Qui intoned, "sometimes I go out to the film award banquets with Lucian. I've seen Dr. Kro in person, most of his hunk is computer generated."

Lenda scoffed, "I knew it. Lucian? A son of yours?"

"My other mate."

"You have ...another ...mate?"

"Yes, I am polyamorous," Qui smiled and sideglanced to Aver, noting the frowning thought process scrolling across her face, "don't look so left out. We can watch some while we're here."

 

[Aver Brand]

Well, there went the other shoe.

In fact there were shoes enough to drop in this conversation to outfit a whole company of Sith (or Yun’Do, as it were) but it wasn’t like that was the whole-ass reason for Aver trying her damnedest to weasel out of it in the first place.

Not at all.

She glanced skyward – not that there was a sky to pray to on Nadir – and patiently waited for the inevitability of those wide eyes panning from mate to daughter.

Her patience, however improved from compared to three decades ago, still left much to be desired, so—

“We both are.”

She set down her glass and met Lenda’s gaze head-on before the woman could so much as open her mouth. It had come up before, but that lunch might’ve impressed itself into her memory for… different reasons. Meeting-another-one-of-your-long-lost-children sort of reasons.

“And, um, I’m good.” Despite her furrowed brow, a smile still lurked at the corners of her lips. “Really.”

 

[Quietus]

Lenda had opened her mouth to say something, but her eyes weren't wide, "I-" before Aver cut her off.

"We both are."

"Just as well, she'd probably sleep through them," Quietus rolled her eyes, though it was all play.

"I was going to say I thought you'd said something to that extent before. Suppose I just forgot, makes sense that you both would be, doesn't it," Lenda finally dug into the rest of her meal, taking small bites and chewing quietly, slowly. She didn't get food like this very often, had to savor it. "Have you ... have you seen or heard anything of your broth-" Lenda caught herself, realizing that was likely not the correct way to phrase it, "I mean... Emryc?"

 

[Aver Brand]

Once again she was strung along a line of tension with every twist and turn of a word. Relaxed and taut, pulled to and fro by the current of conversation. Were it anyone else at the table, Aver wanted to think she’d not be so easily manipulated.

Still, it took another hard swig to take the sting out of her disappointment.

She took her time answering, blue eyes trained on the viscous lines staining the walls of her tumbler as she whirled the amber about its glass confines.

“Our last… meeting,” she looked up at Lenda with a faint smile, “wasn’t what you’d call a family affair, exactly. But,” she set her drink down with a clink, “he should be alive and thriving.”

Should – by virtue of the opportunity laid out before him, at least. Whether or not he’d taken up the offer was in no-one’s hands but those of the sour man himself. He certainly hadn’t shown a shred of enthusiasm for her proposition to the contrary – that he take over a throne that had brought him so much misery and pain over the years.

“I gave him the freedom and security to leave this place.”

The thirst for revenge was reserved for the distaff of the family, it seemed.

 

[Quietus]

Lenda nodded, remaining quiet for a time as she recalled that strange day. A day filled with vindication toward the father of her children, and the reunion of two out of the three she'd had stolen from her over the years.

Desdemona watched in her usual silence, taking it all in, noting the fluctuations of emotion and stress billowing unseen from her mate. Feeling the variances in Aver's internal struggle was a bit like watching scattered storms rolling over the jungle canopy. One moment the calm took over, the next the treetops were swaying in the gusting winds, followed by an unsettled calm again as the forest awaited the next round of storms.

"I met him," she interjected lightly, "over dinner one night."

"Oh?" Lenda blinked over at her.

"For what it's worth, I think he's likely doing just fine out in the galaxy considering how well he did for himself here. Out of the inferno and into the various fires, and all."

Lenda gave a small smile at that reassurance, "I can only hope he will do as well as you have, Aver. I had him for several years before they took him from me - did everything I knew to teach him how to survive."

"Did you shove him off a cliff?" Des asked wryly.

 

[Aver Brand]

“Kid-tested, mother-approved – timeless parenting technique, ain’t it?” Aver quipped with a fond look towards the parent in question. She’d never witnessed a cliff-throwing herself – though she’d been a victim, Dreamsphere notwithstanding – but the flying children had all survived into adulthood and beyond.

As far as she knew, anyhow. Hadn’t seen Dahl for several years now.

“I can find him for you.” Aver frowned, glancing down at her empty plate. “If you’d like. Well—” a small laugh escaped her, “I can get you his number. Doubt he’d appreciate me dragging him to your doorstep.”

“Speaking of…” she started carefully, trailing a finger along the rim of her empty glass. “If you’d like a vacation or… something, I can sort that for you. With work and… funds.”

You wouldn’t know it looking at her now, but Aver did daily negotiate with ruthless pirates and crime lords from the filthiest depths of space.

 

[Quietus]

Des could sense the rising hope in Lenda, but the woman was doing a good job of keeping her expression tempered.

Lenda nodded, "I would love a chance to talk with him, even if only by comm. Maybe that would be best, even. Less ... expectations?"

"Less awkwardness," Des offered, "Seems like a good place to start." If Emryc had struck her as anything other than stoic, it was mildly awkward in person. She had a strong suspicion that the man didn't do much in the way of casual socialization beyond killing/interrogating/torturing ... and of course, his weekend bedding.

She looked up with mild surprise at Aver's offer for vacation. Wow, the woman was making big strides today. Couldn't help but feel a bit proud over here.

"Vacation?" Lenda questioned, looking around with uncertainty, "I ... well, that certainly sounds nice. I've never really taken one before. I have no idea what I'd do."

 

[Aver Brand]

Aver nodded and gave Qui’s knee a grateful squeeze as she smoothly stepped in to take over the conversation. The respite was a welcome one, and the mercenary jumped at the chance to prolong it by busying herself with the dessert.

Three plates with an elaborate sculpture of honeycomb, ice cream, and balsamic obligingly floated in front of her as she set the table with ice brandy and dainty little forks.

“You do… whatever you want. That’s pretty much the whole point.” Aver grinned around her first mouthful, exhaling at the exquisite taste that bloomed on her palate.

As usual, she’d outdone herself.

“Visit places you ain’t never been, explore planets that still got some greenery on ‘em, drop by Zeltros maybe…” she snorted and took a long sip of the wine before she choked on her cake. “Fuckton to see out there, really.”

 

[Quietus]

Lenda watched with quiet wonder as the desserts floated their way to the table and blinked down at the plate that settled itself before her. She wasn't sure she'd ever get used to these strange, esoteric powers being so casually displayed before her, let alone the luxury that seemed to go with it.

Qui cut herself a small bite of the dessert, making sure to get a portion of each piece, and casually scooched the plate towards her mate as if it were an evening ritual. Not so far from the truth, as soon as Aver learned she wasn't big on sweets her portions automatically defaulted to Aver's portions. Win win for Aver.

"Whatever I want..." Lenda pondered that as she took a bite, remarking at the delectible taste, "this is delicious."

"If the prospect of choosing is too overwhelming," Qui said after her small bite, "I have a place on Borleias you could stay at. Private tropical island on a resort planet, all amenities included." Maybe a bit cliche for a vacation spot, but for someone who had never taken one? It would be paradise.

"I -" clearly Lenda also wasn't used to such generosity, "I will have to think on it. Maybe see if my boyfriend has some place he'd like to go, too. Thank you both."

 

[Aver Brand]

"This is delicious."

Something small and fragile and soft blossomed in her breast at the praise. Once she might’ve quashed it in its infancy – or, to be more precise, it would never have sprouted at all.

Aver cleared her throat and glanced down at her work. “Thanks.”

Now she let it linger, encompassing the sentiment with gentle hands, cradling it behind her ribs like the precious, rare treasure it was. This careful peace quirked her lips into a faint smile as she chipped away at her caramelized dessert, forgetting for once to eye the plate of her mate with a ravenous gaze.

How come you’ve never invited me to your private tropical paradise, darling?

Amused blue eyes panned over to Qui, then dropped down to the minuscule bites she was taking out of her own dessert. If she didn’t know better, she’d’ve been offended by the gesture.

These days, it just meant more for me.

“Sure, there’s no rush. Just…” she sat back in her chair, shrugging with her hands, “credits really ain’t a problem.”

 

[Quietus]

The entire experience of Aver acknowledging the compliment and accepting it was shared and felt by Des in such a way that struck her as damn near profound. Even the knee squeeze of thanks moments earlier and how kindly she was being with Lenda ... big strides. Really big strides. She might've swelled with pride for the woman had Aver not jabbed that comment about the home on Borleias.

Her expression fell flat, but only for a moment.

Because I never go there.

"Thank you, really. That's very generous of you both," Lenda nodded as she enjoyed the dessert. Was she mistaken or was there a hint of bonding going on here? Or was Aver Brand hiding behind a face of generosity, hoping such a gesture would placate her into thinking so? Lenda couldn't help but think that there was more of Beirric in the woman before her than either of them knew.

"Are you not a sweets person?" she asked gently at Des.

"Oh, no. They don't agree with me. I like the taste but I'm rather over the suffering for indulgence. More for Aver," she smirked. Happy wife, happy life, no?

"I won't take it personally then if you don't try the pie. Mm, but I do wonder ..." Lenda inspected the bite of dessert on her fork, "if I could make something like this to serve at the diner. I'm always looking for new recipes. This is much more exquisite than our customers could afford, but a simplified version would be really nice."

"All Aver," Des gestured to her mate, "one of her many talents."