Private If I Could Turn Back Time [Complete]

[Katarine Ryiah]

If I could turn back time​

Location: Mos Eisley - Tatooine
Objective: Meet Old Face
Tags: Mak Manto


You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. The saying was famous by now, but even as Katarine walked the dusty street she couldn't help but reflect upon it. The Jedi Investigator was long used to the underworld by now, but one did not often see a blind eye turned towards murder as easily as they did at this spaceport. Katarine could not pin point exactly what she was doing on Tatooine, but ever since taking the Barash Vow she knew her path would include some wandering. Today's wandering took her to Chalmun's Spaceport Cantina, an infamous place with many connections to the past.

The door to the Mos Eisley Cantina swung open with a creak, and a sudden hush fell over the rowdy patrons. The crowd, accustomed to the rough and tumble of smugglers, bounty hunters, and scoundrels, momentarily froze, trying to get a sense of who just arrived. She was a short woman, standing only a few inches over five feet and though eyes swept over her they didn't sense she was a threat. The Jedi's sharp gaze scanned the room with a calm that contrasted sharply against the chaotic energy of the cantina. The bar droid's mechanical voice sputtered nervously as the patrons returned to their conversations, though the murmur of curiosity lingered. Her own curiosity surged as she wondered why the Force had brought her to such a place.

 

[Mak Manto]

"HOW IN THE NAME OF CHAOS ARE YOU EVEN ALIVE? NO ONE CAN DRINK THAT MUCH!"

Downing another shot of Corellian scotch in a single gulp, Mak's eyes were bloodshot as he looked up into the Trandoshan's face, his beard sagging as he kept eyes with the man.

"You owe me 200 credits now... You just keep losing every time we make a bet..."

Feeling the alcohol battling the inside of his stomach, Mak breathed hard for a few seconds, trying to stop himself from vomiting everywhere before it eventually passed. A frown appeared on Mak's face as he held his lower left hand and felt the credits land in it, the Trandoshan growling before walking away. Placing them in his robe, Mak didn't even bother looking at the bartender, shouting at the top of his voice.

"GET ME ANOTHER BOTTLE OF SCOTCH! I DON'T WANT TO SEE THE BOTTOM OF THIS GLASS AGAIN!"

Looking around at the other patrons, Mak slammed his cane against the ground.

"Come on! Anyone else in here think they can outdrink me?!"

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

If I could find a way​

Tags: Mak Manto

"HOW IN THE NAME OF CHAOS ARE YOU EVEN ALIVE?....."

"I'm wondering that myself." She spoke quietly to herself as she approached the bar. It wasn't unheard of for some Jedi to have survived and ended up in the future like this. So far she had met a few but she still couldn't help but feel a little odd as her deep green eyes fell upon Mak Manto. He had been a master back when she was just a young padawan.

"I think you've had enough my friend." She stepped up beside him and blinked, wondering if he would even recognize her.

 

[Mak Manto]

Sighing tiredly, Mak pulled out his pipe and snapped his fingers, producing a small flame that sat in the palm of his hand as he lit up it up. As a steady stream of smoke escape his nose and mouth, Mak chuckled.

"Listen, I don't need anyone to tell me when to stop drinking... I WAS PROBABLY DRINKING BEFORE YOU'RE GRANDMOTHER'S GRANDMOTHER WAS EVEN-"

Turning around to see who was lecturing him, Mak's eyes fell on the diminutive woman and for a second, his eyes were narrowed before they opened up wide. Falling back in his seat, Mak rubbed his eyes with two fingers, wondering if the alcohol was playing a trick on them, but as she came back into focus, Mak felt his jaw drop.

"Katatine... RYIAH?"

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

I'd take back those words that have hurt you​

Tags: Mak Manto

"Katatine... RYIAH?"

"I hope so otherwise I'm wearing the wrong underwear." The Chiss on the other side of Mak chuckled at Kat but otherwise kept sipping his smoking drink, paying the two no mind.

"Mak Manto.... it's been a long time. Surely you haven't been drinking for nine hundred years?"

 

[Mak Manto]

Mak just sat there, staring at her at what felt like an extremely long time. As the bartender came up and dropped off another bottle of scotch, he felt his breathing quicken as the alcohol began to battle inside of him again.

"How are you... I thought... I was sure I was alone... I didn't think anyone I knew would be in this time... I've been here for close to a year..."

Opening the bottle of scotch, Mak didn't even waste the time of pouring it in the shot glass but drank it straight from the bottle, downing a good amount.

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

And you'd stay​

Tags: Mak Manto

"How are you... I thought... I was sure I was alone... I didn't think anyone I knew would be in this time... I've been here for close to a year..."

"It's a long story but there are a few of us from the old days still around. I've even met some older than us. But perhaps we should discuss this at a booth."

Her deep green eyes scanned the bar patrons, knowing they might be listening. It wouldn't be wise to just blurt out this was a Jedi reunion in a place such as this.

"Or we could get you sobered up...."

 

[Mak Manto]

"FRAK THAT! We're getting a damn booth..."

Grabbing the bottle, Mak stood up, his tail allowing him to reach an impressive 7'6. Looking around the cantina, Mak spotted one that was empty, but the surrounding booths were full of drinkers talking to one another. As they sat down, Mak looked at the nearby patrons sitting near them and he rose his voice again.

"WE WANT SOME PRIVACY!"

As they flinched and got up, moving to other booths or to the bar itself, Mak poured Kat a shot of scotch as she took a seat.

"You first... How did you get here...?"

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

I don't know why I did the things I did​

Tags: Mak Manto

She had to hand it to him, he had a way of clearing a space. If she had tried that she would have been mince meat. Of course being a seven foot tall alien with a tail that could smash through a skull probably helped. She chuckled and followed him over to the booth. She motioned to a passing waitress who brought two waters over, though Katarine was starting to realize Mak was not quit ready to sober up just yet. All in good time.

"You first... How did you get here...?"

Ah yea, that. She supposed she didn't have to go into the grizzly details about her past. He might not be drunk enough to hear about her mistakes without lecturing her. After all he was one of the people who helped run the order when she was just a baby padawan! The thought made her feel old.

"Well the short version is I was frozen in carbonite. Three years ago Naboo had a netherworld crisis and my carbination chamber was released. I woke up in Theed General Hospital and battled carbonation sickness for two and a half years. It was rough, but the past six months or so I've been healthy and trying to play catch up."

 

[Mak Manto]

Mak placed his upper right hand under his chin as he listened to her story. The third lower left hand ran through his beard occasionally while the lower right hand would bring the pipe up to his mouth for a quick smoke. His upper left hand poured a smaller amount of scotch into his waiting mouth as she finished. Mak's eyes narrowed for a second as he thought on her story.

"How and why were you frozen in carbonite?"

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

I don't know why I said the things I said​

Tags: Mak Manto

Why did old teachers always have that knack for asking the exact question you didn't want them to? She practically wanted to roll her eyes at him like a disgruntled teenager. She didn't of course, but she was sure back in her padawan days she must have rolled her eyes at some Jedi Master. Probably Spark Vallen if she had to guess.

"Like I said it's a long story, but I was frozen in an underwater prison. The prison was destroyed when a Netherworld portal opened on Naboo."

She took a sip of her water and swallowed. "But how did you end up drinking on Tatooine? Have you left the Order?"

 

[Mak Manto]

"Yeah... I'm a dimensional exile rogue Jedi Master..."

Mak took a deep inhale on the pipe, letting out a cloud of smoke to the ceiling as he closed his eyes and thought on why he was in bars and cantinas nonstop.

"I've been in this... timeframe for about a year now. You know who I am, what I'm really like; it didn't take too much to really get the Jedi Council to want me be gone, especially after the whole Dathomir debacle. I figured I only had one good option left in my life, and that was a honorable death..."

Drinking slowly, Mak's eyes opened and drifted to Kat.

"I decided to attack Malic head on. You remember him?"

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

Pride's like a knife, it can cut deep inside​

Tags: Mak Manto

"I've heard of him... though I don't think I ever had the pleasure of meeting him in person. That honorable death didn't seem to work out for you thought... "

She took a sip of her water and let her deep green eyes travel around the cantina. It was weird to suddenly feel just like old times.

"Well there isn't just one Council in this galaxy. The Jedi are all fractured and following different leaders."

 

[Mak Manto]

"Of course it didn't work out... I'm an arrogant bastard. We were both trying to kill each other and he used Force Storm to create a hyperspace wormhole to destroy the moon we were fighting on and I used dimension shift to stop it, thinking that it would be powerful enough. It created... a spatial vortex that caught the both of us and so here I am, hundreds of years later in the future..."

Raising the bottle in a mock celebration, Mak downed the rest of the bottle.

"And what does that mean to me, Kat?" It didn't even dawn on him that he used the old nickname he used to call her when she was a padawan, when times had been far more simpler.

"I don't know any of these Jedi. I don't know pretty much anyone. The only person I speak to is this kid who gets me information from around the Galaxy, so I can keep tabs on where Malic is."

"You're the true Jedi Master now, Kat. Not me."

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

Words are like weapons, they wound sometimes​

Tags: Mak Manto

"You're the true Jedi Master now, Kat. Not me."

"Let's not get carried away."

She was far from a true Jedi Master. When she thought about the great Jedi of the time such as Valery Noble and Romi Jade Katarine was a pitiful comparison. She'd never be a galactic hero or rise to fame, but such is the way of an investigator. They clung to the shadows and lived undercover.

"Look Mak you have a choice to make." It felt weird to call him Mak. He'd been present at her knighting ceremony for crying out loud! But she rolled with it.

"The past is gone. It will never be like it was. You can either sit in this cantina drinking yourself to death or you can rejoin the galaxy and uphold the Code you swore to honor. Maybe it's time to make up for past mistakes."

 

[Mak Manto]

Mak picked up the empty bottle, staring at the Corellian label. Drinking was easy; all you had to do was put your lips to the glass and all of your problems disappeared.

So many Jedi that he had known that were now gone. Hundreds of years later, and the same problems were still going on, with the Jedi and the Sith, with the Empire and the Rebels, with the bounty hunters and the pirates, with the Witches and the Mandalorians...

"That easy, huh?"

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

I didn't really mean to hurt you​

Tags: Mak Manto


"It's not easy at all. That's the point. What you are doing now is easy, but is it what you want to do for the rest of your life?"

She paused and glanced over her shoulder as a small bar fight broke out. Someone got knocked out cold and eventually the crowd went back to drinking and gambling. Violence was so normal here people barely recognized it.

"You could always become a moisture farmer. Settle down. Have some babies.... they let the Jedi do that now. Almost every Jedi I've met has a family."

 

[Mak Manto]

Mak stared at her for a few seconds before he felt something on his face that he hadn't experienced in years: a genuine smile.

"Kat, you've been drinking water this entire time, so I know you're not drunk. I'm a 205 year old snake. Who do you think I'm going to be having children with?"

 

[Katarine Ryiah]

I didn't wanna see you go​

Tags: Mak Manto


Katarine grinned at him, happy that she had produced a genuine smile in the man. "Well in that case it sounds like you better get your snake butt back to work. No rest for the wicked."

This time she actually did pick up the shot that had been poured for her and down it. It burned all the way down and she chased it with water and blinked back tears from her eyes. Katarine was not a drinker by any means.

"Plus I think considering the time jump you better make that a thousand year old snake. I'm not drunk enough to do the math but we are both old enough to know better."

If he was over a thousand what did that make her? Eesh she didn't want to think about it.

 

[Mak Manto]

Mak simply stared at her for a minute, his beard rising and falling as he thought about old memories, about his actions in the past, about friends and enemies long gone.

"Alright..."

Taking a deep inhale, Mak allowed for the smoke to come through his nose.

"I'm not saying that I won't come back with you, but I'm not joining up officially for the time being. You can consider me a rogue Jedi who's affiliated with whatever Jedi Order you're part of."