Invasion A.D.

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

He ignored the comment about the temple, they both knew that it was a warning made out of emotion and wasn't rooted into logic and rationality. Whilst she got overly emotional Khaleel kept the peace and simply waited for her to finish her piece.

Then the Underlord laid down the facts.

"This ain't no Coruscant or Onderon, lass." it was Nar Shaddaa and that was a different beast entirely. "Our police force is either nonexistent or corrupt to the core."

"If we catch 'em they will walk right back out again, and next time they will know we are coming." steady hands started pouring both of them a drink again, they would need it. "The Republic is too busy getting its teeth kicked in and in the end they ain't got jurisdiction here, means that we can't take the guys to 'Pubs territory. Not without raising a huge diplomatic stink anyway."

Khal raised his eyebrow and studied Kana.

"So where does that leave us? Do we 'respect all life'? or do we 'guard the peace' and 'use our powers to defend' all innocent?"

He threw the Jedi Code right back at her and showed her exactly why it was a theoretical writing that held little ground in the real world. Where most of the time you were posed with situations that made you betray one oath to keep another.

 

[Kana Truden]

Silence reigned as the code was thrown against her in retaliation. On top of the hard facts it was almost enough for her to throw a fit, but she decided against that. The code was after all a contradicting piece of text but it wasn’t the code itself that was important to her as much as the morals. After all, it was practically Wheaton’s law with a few contradictions and moral dilemmas tossed in, good times.

Kana stared bitterly at [member="Khaleel Malvern"] and quickly shook her head as her face scrunched up. “Clever guy. A code full of contradictions. What else is new, Blasto?” Her hand reached up to form a L-shaped phone that she put by her ear. “Oh what’s that? Killing people puts us on the same level as those we’re trying to protect? Oh why thank you very much, I didn’t know that.”

She hung up the imaginary phone call. “Stuff it, Khal. You can be the lone frontier cowboy act you’re trying to pull or you can try to swallow your preachings and accept the fact that you asked a Jedi for help and not some low-life gangbanger.”

“Now what is the plan, really. Give me the short version and we’ll go right away. All this sitting around makes me want to have another drink, and we don’t want that.”

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

He finished off his last drink, had found out long ago that alcohol and his liver had a very interesting relationship. Might have something to do with his literal immortality, might have to do with whatever the feth had happened in the Nether- point was, his liver could handle all the alcohol he threw at it and then some.

Girl was making him thirsty and not for all the right reasons this time.

‘I didn’t ask a Jedi, Mouse.’ Khal answered softly, putting down his glass. ‘I asked a friend.’

Didn’t allow himself to be thrown into emotional rollercoaster ride though, instead he stood up, turning his back towards the girl he loved. Not in that way. Love as a friend, love as a woman he had grown used to having around; for better or worse.

He walked over to the cabinet with drinks, closed it firmly. Might be a token that he had had enough drinks for this night anyway, whatever his liver had to say about it.

‘Short version is, I got a few leads. We are gonna look up on ‘em, see where it gets us. If we find ‘em, we shut ‘em down.’

Any way possible.

 

[Kana Truden]

The sound of a woman sighing, the sound of a glass hitting the floor as the rest of the drink was downed. If ever she was stubborn. Now would be a good time to get up, and she would have if not for the error in her ways. The room was suddenly a lot more boat-like than she remembered. Had she been working out? Her legs felt soft, only a little, but they felt soft.

She had to play it cool. She knew how to deal. After all, she had totally reached the state she strived for.

And a little more than that. Lightweight.

“Yyyup, we's gotsta go.” A slight stutter in her voice. Imbalance, she certainly knew her condition. She didn’t like it. “I’m sorry, I should have figured it was a friend and not a jedi.”

“So where do we go first? I need fresh air, or well, as much of fresh air as you can get on this forsaken planet. Also for other raisins, but mostly the first one.”

[member="Khaleel Malvern"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

Khal shrugged and turned around, he was gonna say it was all good. In the grand scheme of things he should have realized that even Kana would only think of him as a low-life gangbanger. That was the way of things, his rep and he would never shake it, no matter how hard he tried.

But then he noticed her unsteadiness, eyes fell on the glass and a raised eyebrow followed. A single glass and that? Sometimes he forgot that most folks didn’t have his liver or habit of drinking, when ya drink your entire life… shet’s come easy to ya.
That said… it had been a strong drink, even he was feeling just a little bit lightheaded.

‘Ehm, hold up, cowgirl.’ Khal finally replied, scratching his chin. ‘Might be best if we get you a bunk for the night.’

‘I can handle tonight’s scouting alone.’

Have been doing it alone for a long while, what made me think this would ever be different?

 

[Kana Truden]

“You sure about that, Blasto?” Her eyes closed, her eyebrows lift up. A bed didn’t seem half-bad at this point. The trip here had certainly not been a good one for sleeping. “I mean, okay, if you know a clean place I could very certainly much use a good nap.”

Didn’t change the fact that Kana was acting in a slightly unusual manner, at least for her. The new her anyway. Her walk set it’s way towards the door, because clearly that was where [member="Khaleel Malvern"] was going to go eventually. “So tell me something here, Khaleel, this place is so... “ She had to find a nice word, one of the clever ones. “Putrid.” Or not.

“Why do you stay here? You could have been at the temple, sitting on your butt all day and look really deep.” It was what most jedi did, right? Well that and a wide variety of other things. “Why aren’t you?”

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

She wasn’t doing a good job of walking ‘cool’, it was more a slug-pace while trying desperately hard not to fall over just like that, they were friends and so he did the only thing he thought would fit in this particular situation.

Walking over he let her lean on him, and they started walking together again. Outta the little backroom, they would walk back into the common room that usually held the customers of Jimmy’s.

The bar had been closed today though, anticipation of what was to come, so it was empty right now.

‘It’s more…’ Khal had trouble finding words that really fit. He had lived with the Ysanna for a few years, one with nature and all that stuff. Had been pleasant and they had taught him a lot of things, some of those things weren’t Jedi like.

‘Real.’

A shrug followed. He believed that the Jedi Order was too disconnected from the people it was supposedly here to help. They lived up in their pretty temples, white marble, clean living and harmony, but what did they know about the suffering?

Nothing, zip, nada.

Khal hadn’t wanted to be one of those characters. A man who would judge people without even knowing what they were on about, that was the reason why he had felt that the Temples weren’t for him.

It was here that he could do something good, while not missing out on the profound connection between those he was supposed to protect.

‘You hanging in there, mouse?’ Khal calmly asked, voice a bit hushed as his chin accidently brushed her cheek.

 

[Kana Truden]

Real. There was a distinct difference in realities when faced with a temple and other places such as this on Nar Shaddaa, that much was certain. Life may have been easy in the temples, even if food was on the very spartanic ‘need to get by’ basis. It was secure, which in reality was most likely exactly why so many things could go wrong when faced with problems outside of it.

“Yeah, real.” She quietly mused as the man led her away from the bar. “I’m good, just need to walk this off, really.”

Yet the streets had gone so quiet. If you blocked out the palpable sense of desperation it could have been one of the lower levels of Coruscant. There was that weird sense of relative safety, certainly a step up from the roads they had passed to get here. For every intent and purpose the walk could have passed as simply two friends going home after a long night.

“It’s not easy every time though. There’s always that one spot of bother that makes you wonder why you go on, right?” She looked up at [member="Khaleel Malvern"]. “I don’t mean that I’d give up, but there’s been times when everything has felt so hopeless.”

“What I’m trying to say is that life as a jedi isn’t easy either. We feel the effects of all these defeats as well. They hurt. People dying, getting captured or turned. We seem to lose so many yet gain so few.”

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

‘Mhm.’ Khal grunted in acknowledgement, what else was there to do when she posed that particular puzzle to him? Why was it that more and more Jedi were being seduced by the Darkside by the minute, whilst few if any folks these days found themselves to the light? Could he even say anything without being a hypocrite? Shet’s never been easy for him, but at least he had been given a chance.

Look at him now, a Jedi? Think not. Lightside? Debatable. It were the many shades of gray he was moving between right now and it was only getting more muddy by the moment, would there be a moment that Khal would look in the mirror and stop being able to recognize himself?

Plausible.

He used to sleep on the second floor of Jimmy’s, but with the Ravens… nah, that ain’t safe anymore. Which was why the Gray Paladins had taken to setting up little retreats, pockets of havens within the folds of the city.

She would be safe there, protected by the many levels and lines of security that were put in place.

Say one thing about the Gray Paladins, say they knew how to hide in plain sight.

‘Can’t help ya with your crisis, Kana.’ usage of her first name, he didn’t do that often. It felt too… familiar. Few people were close enough to him to warrant that, and he liked to keep it that way. ‘I know this though.’

He sighed.

‘The Republic, the Order. They feel like politics to me. Don’t disagree that there are good apples in there too, but ya know the saying.’

Something with rotten apples and them being the minority.

The Jedi Order and the Republic felt like the inverse though.

‘Trying to say is, you are a good person.’ he tried to give the words some credibility, pressed her a bit to his side. Vestige of a hug, but not quite. There were some things that he just wouldn’t do.

‘You will figure it out.’

 

[Kana Truden]

The habit of picking just the one word continued. In this case ‘politics.’ It had that bitter echo to it, repercussions, being monitored by and limited to acting under the Republic’s influence. The close partnership the Order had with the Senate certainly spelled trouble in more ways than just protecting the queen from assassins or bounty hunters. There were a few jedi who had no wish to participate in the wars, but living under the blue banners there were only so many ways a jedi could repay their ‘debt owed’ to the Republic.

She leaned in to the not-hug-hug. “Yeah.”

“It’s oddly quiet outside tonight, isn’t it? Last time I was here there were more explosions. It's a kinda weird story, but I can tell you about it if you want.”

[member="Khaleel Malvern"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

Strangely enough he was enjoying himself somewhat, her presence soothing to a degree and making the thoughts churning in his mind take a little break for a while. The streets were quiet, peaceful, relaxed, that’s what the Exchange had done for this particular district on Nar Shaddaa.

Bring organization to the crime and making it serve a purpose, taking the money they took from the undeserving and putting it right back in the community. The Ravens were a different breed, no respect for tradition, no respect for anything but their crappy organization.

‘I’d like that.’ Khal finally answered with a short nod, his eyes ever roaming the streets. They were peaceful yes, but in Nar Shaddaa there was no middle ground. You were either very cautious or you were dead.

It was one of the edges that the Jedi Order could never instill into their padawans, because you had to be born with it. Be born living your every second in the expectation of death by starvation, stabbing wounds or anything else.

Not a particularly pleasant lifestyle that, granted.

 

[Kana Truden]

“So me and my friend were in charge of delivering goods here, some sort of refugee camp for the war or something like that.” She shrugged. “Yeah, we knew it most likely wasn’t a refugee camp but you can’t blame people for being naive at one point or another, right?”

“Everything had gone well, we got through the atmosphere, we flew around the city…” She sighed. “Then we landed.”

It was that one part in the story that still baffled her, how could she not know the perps name? In a sense it was probably for the best. She had been outraged by the incident at first, the man who had blown her ship up and gotten away with it. The ending of it all was very fuzzy, blurry, but it still was a memory she couldn’t let go of.

“However, our logs or whatever had been hacked, our ship’s course diverted. We landed on a platform only to be met by three people. A gunslinger, a dark jedi and a chiss with really weird hair.” She still didn’t know it was [member="Cryax Bane"]. “They wanted our goods, we said no, they wanted our goods again, we still said no. Didn’t take long for a fight to break out.”

“One thing to another the chiss eventually blew up my ship, and then things get kind of hazy. I distinctly remember he got away though, along with the others.”

“So what about you? You ever have one of those moments you find hard to let go of for reasons that are beyond you?”

[member="Khaleel Malvern"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

A chiss with really weird hair, active on Nar Shaddaa, who has the knowledge to hack a ship. That still meant there could be a lot of possibilities, but he had the distinct idea that this… might have been Cryax Bane and that made him sigh just a little bit. It seemed that keeping a tight ship was a multi-faceted idea for the likes of Bane, but what was done was done and they couldn’t exactly go back in time right now.

‘Yeah.’ Khal replied, after a moment of thought. ‘Couple of my crew were kidnapped some time ago, this was right after the rapture.’ it was the particular name he had coined for the time when billions, trillions had simply disappeared from the Galaxy without a trace.

He himself had been there, in Hell and this had happened after he was back again. Shet had become hectic when criminal elements had tried to take advantage of his disappearance, didn’t work out all that well for them.

‘Managed to track ‘em down.’ Them and Dominia, the Promenade Princess. ‘Rescued them and solved the problem.’

Khal shrugged.

‘They made it personal when they went after my friends.’

 

[Kana Truden]

“I remember the Nether well.” Even while slightly inebriated it was easy to remember, hell it was probably easier to remember. “Plains of blood, rivers of darkness, millions of souls stuck in some weird sense of limbo. I would not wish it on anyone.”

For death wasn’t her deal. Technically it was, there had been a time when she would have gladly died for her cause but with time came the realization that living is the ultimate form of existence. The code, the teaching, they all mention ‘becoming one with the force’ but to die was to stop existing altogether. Maybe it was a bit ironic, the healer who was afraid of death, but it was such a certainty that the only question that remained to be answered was when it would happen.

Right, this was why she never drank. Moods swerved left and right as the troubled mind of a woman went hard to work in an effort to undermine the last few years spent at the temple.

“It was the first time I went back home since joining the Order.” Painful memory. “Back to Alderaan and the… They…”

Her hands clinged, pinching at [member="Khaleel Malvern"]’s arm. She didn’t need this right now.

“It’s destroyed, ruined. My home is in ruins.”

Jedi didn't cry, they always had something in their eyes. Pent up, long forgotten things in their eyes.

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

Ya know.

I ain’t an emotional guy, not by any stretch of the imagination at least. Never digged emotions, they were for the other guys, for the other people who had the luxury of dealing with ‘em. But I was there on Alderaan, the burning skies, the smog and ashes that were spewed by Yuuzhan Vong-made volcanoes.

It was on Alderaan that I had fought those beasts to reclaim the planet for the Republic and it had been on that planet that I had felt my first touch with the Nether, so I knew what she was talking about.

And I knew that it didn’t matter that the Republic was formally in control of the world once again. Because you don’t erase that kind of destruction, that kind of death by simply stamping your name on the world again.

They were all dead and they would stay dead.

I think it was this realization that prompted me to put my hands around Kana, in the grand scheme of things it didn’t matter what I thought about emotions and showing them, because in the grand scheme of things? This was a friend, one who had lost her homeworld and the people she knew.

Who knew how long she had held this inside herself, not allowing herself to feel.

It wasn’t awkward for some reason. Not for me atleast, even though I had expected it to be. I gently stroked her back, didn’t tell her it would be okay though. Words were wasted on a situation such as this.

It wouldn’t be okay. The Sith had burned a world and it would never be the same, no matter what we wanted. But in time the pain would blunt and she would be able to move on, not a thing you tell a grieving person though.

So instead I simply was there for her, allowed her to draw strength from my presence.

For as long as she needed it.

 

[Kana Truden]

Her breathing eventually calmed down. Mention of her home had become the source of much grief at this point for reasons she was certain [member="Khaleel Malvern"] was well aware of after her little breakdown. It was nothing compared to when she was still a Padawan, but with time you learned to bottle it up and seal it away. The mix of fear and hatred as she left the Netherworld had brought her to her knees. A flirt with the ‘wrong side of the tracks’ on it’s own.

“I wanted to murder them all.” She sobbed as the man stroked her back. “I wanted to go to Coruscant and slaughter every single one, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t.”

Inhale, exhale, all in shivers. “When I had first heard the reports as a Padawan, I was devastated, when I saw it for myself…” No words. “The questions at the back of my mind resurfaced, why me? Why was it that I survived when none of my friends did? Why am I alive?”

Kana escaped the man’s hold on her. “We should find that bed, I need to stop moping around already.”

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

He hadn’t ever been good with emotions, so in some ways it was a relief when she finally decided enough was enough and escaped his hug. In other ways he suddenly felt himself ache in his own heart, the why and the how escaped him, but it was there, a pit that was increasing by the moment.

But he was Khaleel Malvern, the Bloodless, some named him Bloody-Nine and others called him an immortal. Crying was for the rest, there was no rest for the wicked and so he simply nodded.

In truth they were close to the hideout, no matter what Khal wouldn’t have stopped in the middle of the street to hug the woman if he wasn’t entirely sure that there was a quick bug-out opportunity if needed. This might be Exchange-territory, but it was still Nar Shaddaa.

You are either maximum cautious, or you are dead. There is no in between.

Finally then they passed an alleyway, Khal kept walking, until he noticed they passed another alleyway only a few feet after the first one- and it was the same alleyway. A thing that tipped him off.

A smile barely hidden he guided Kana in the alleyway and the place shifted, subtly, one wouldn’t even notice it if they didn’t know what to look for.

Things had changed after the Nether, this was one of those changes.

A door was settled into a non-descript wall, runes carved into the plain steel. Yeah, this was the place.

 

[Kana Truden]

One alley, two alley, same alley. The feeling of walking in circles grew larger by the moment until the two friends eventually stopped by a wall. Weird carvings in the metal, a barely noticeable archway into what Kana could only assume was this ‘safehouse’ he was probably leading her to.

Her hand placed itself upon the rune. “This it? We press here or something?”

She applied force to the rune, both physical and force-force with little idea how that’d work for her.

[member="Khaleel Malvern"]

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Kana Truden"]

Khal was just about to raise his hand as a warning, but it was too late already.

The moment Kana tried to influence the door with the Force she would be hit by the direct equivalent of kinetic force. One of the many defenses built into the safehouse was a proportionate answer to any threat leveled.

Don’t ask what would happen if someone throws a molotov cocktail at the door, some things weren’t meant to be asked and this was definitely one of those things.

She would have had to step onto the raised step in front of the door, meant that the push would have probably made her fall down.

If that happened Khal would be there to catch her.

‘You okay?’

He didn’t comment on the situation, it was awkward enough as is.

 

[Kana Truden]

Her attempts at forcing the door open caused her to be pushed back in return, her legs giving way as she collapsed into [member="Khaleel Malvern"] again. She blew a curl out of her face in annoyance. Even a door, a non-sentient object could use her state against her. For shame.

“Well that clearly didn’t work.” She got up with a huff. “Open the door, Khal before I start kicking at it, or something.”

She bowed down and pointed both arms for the door. This was beyond her, she gave up on first try, her state did not allow her to go on. Also it would be good to see the big bad man be pushed around too, the idea of which had her taking out an early victory as the giggling began.

“After you.” She rose up from her bow.