Let's take it right back to where it all began...

[Kana Truden]

“I know.” Kana winced at the blunt remark before she softened up and let her shoulders hunch down. “I know.”

There was still no questioning the pleasantries of the Jedi. For all that it seemed to matter, talking to Jacen made high treason feel like small-talk. Maybe not quite, but he most certainly had that thing to him. Trusting him was easy, or perhaps it was just Kana in general who trusted people far too easily. Case and point, the people she was bringing up in her story of ‘woe.’

“I would like that, Jason.” Kana sat down on her bed. “But, perhaps I should stay in my cell. Give me a moment to think on things while you get it all sorted. What if I do something stupid again?”

She looked over at [member="Jacen Voidstalker"].

“Like try to run away, or worse.” She shook her head. “Besides that I have a lot to think on.”

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]

"That you understand what you've done means we haven't lost you yet Kana. As suspicious as I usually am, I'm fairly certain you lost your way and didn't set out to cause harm. I honestly don't believe you'd do anything worse than attempt to run away," he said with a small smile.

"You'd have to get through me and to two Knights who'd be following us from a distance first. I'm not about to tell you all the other layers you'd have to go through to get out of here, but needless to say I don't advise trying it. I'll be back in a few."

Jacen headed back up to the surface and went to find one of the GADF's secure terminals. From there he set out an official message to go through command over to [member="Thurion Heavenshield"] Part of the message read:



This is the full set of information we believe was taken by the One Sith in the compromise. Personally I don't believe any of it is particularly sensitive beyond the location that was being used as a Shadow Enclave. I was pleased to see that the location on Ossus was being secured as any important military asset on my last visit.

Kind Regards,

Marshal Voidstalker


It was perhaps thirty minutes before he returned to the cell, a bottle of water in one hand. Once again he set himself down on the small metal stool.

"Right then, time to carry on with the explanations I'm afraid. Did you decide whether you wanted to get some fresh air?

 

[Kana Truden]

Kana didn’t respond. She merely nodded her head and watched as the man left her cell to go about his business. Now was the moment to seize it all, right? She pushed her back against the wall and let her head lean back. Eyes closed she contemplated just exactly what she was going to say, what it was that she needed to say. It still felt pointless to nag about Ruusan after all this time, but it had been the cataclysm for it all. That one moment that made her want to disappear in the first place.

Maybe she could talk about that later. Right now they were here for the important matters. They wanted answers from the present, not the past. With a sigh she continued thinking on the present. About Coruscant, about the Ziost mistake, about Nar Shaddaa.

At least until the cell opened again, and in stepped Jacen once more.

“Yeah, maybe something that isn’t a cramped cell would be nice.” Kana nodded and extended both of her arms as if she fully expected to be cuffed. “You wanted to know about Nar Shaddaa.”

“Unlike most of the other things, that one is a rather short story.”

“I wanted to get away.” She took a deep breath. “Away from her.”

[member="Jacen Voidstalker"]

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]

Jacen looked down at her wrists, mentally weighing up his options. For all his bravado she was a renowned Jedi warrior who had stood against the strongest of the Sith Lords. Now she was also touched by the dark side, confused and unpredictable.

He looked up to fix her gaze, opening his mind to the Force at the same time. "Are you going to try and escape?" he asked firmly.

 

[Kana Truden]

"Well, no, but I wouldn't let a recently arrested woman walk around the place without any sort of insurance that she wouldn't run away." Kana shrugged, arms still extended. "Besides, call it a sign in good faith that I am actually willing to co-operate or something."

"It's not about me actually wanting to run away as much as ensuring that I can't run away to begin with."

[member="Jacen Voidstalker"]

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]

"As I said, there are plenty of obstacles starting with you having to get through me and two of my best Knights. Still, I'll take the sign of cooperation as it's offered. You get the cuffs*."

Jacen led her back to the surface, through several guard posts. If Kana was observant she'd see the pair of Knights, one human and one Trandoshan, who fell in behind them at a distance.

"Alright, how did you end up fighting to the death with a bunch of lowlifes in a back alley bleeding out on one of my favourite jackets?"

http://starwarsrp.net/topic/23907-ael-terentattack-cuffs/

 

[Kana Truden]

The cuffs were fastened around the force-user-in-rehabilitation and for the first time in a very long time she felt herself slipping even further into a seat where she was willing to trust this ‘Jason Voidstalker’ character. He was doing his job, she was doing her thing. To see herself incapable of any wide-arched arm movements might have induced a small measure of unease and panic, but in the end she preferred it to be this way. It felt right. Kind of as if she was keeping herself safe from her own ideas as they traversed through the pits, halls and elevators all the way up to the artificial air out and about in the ‘free’ world.

Taking a seat on a nearby bench Kana allowed herself to take a deep breath. She had already taken many deep breaths, obviously, but none of them quite like this. The fresh air was a welcome change from the sulphur-smelling pits in which she had recently situated herself within.

“I guess, in a sense, you could say it all started the second I deserted on Ord Mirit.” She took a second, very slow breath. “I never settled down anywhere, remained on the move for as long as I could. I’ve killed, I’ve abused the kindness of others. I’ve done things I will most likely never forgive myself for. Nar Shaddaa was no different.”

Kana looked at Jacen. The regret for all of the lives that had been lost so mindlessly, effortlessly and for absolutely no good reason at all was evident enough. Her eyebrows furrowed, her nose scrunched in disgust almost.

“It’s easy to get lost in that downwards spiral.” She would admit to herself. “It’s almost addicting, you want to feel that... Thing. The rush of blood, but not your blood. Their blood. You want to feel in control of the situation. Stare them in the eyes, let them know that you have already made your mind right before you do it.”

“I see each face when I sleep at night, I can feel their fear and their hopes and dreams fading into the aether.” Kana covered her eyes and dragged her hand along her face. “But I went too far, ended someone I really shouldn’t have.”

“That was why I was bleeding out on Nar Shaddaa. Because I had brought it upon myself.” There was a short break. “Really, I should have died on Nar Shaddaa. Just like I should have died on Ruusan.”

Kana sighed and covered her eyes once more and began rubbing her eyebrows. It stopped and for a second she looked through the cracks between her fingers straight at Jacen as if not seeing his reaction would help ease up on the shame.

“Still not quite sure how you managed that.”

Then the rubbing of eyebrows began again, as did the hiding from the shame.

[member="Jacen Voidstalker"]

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]
His jaw was tightly set for a moment when she mentioned deserting. For all he sympathised with her story of descending out of control, that didn't sit right with him. Perhaps because whilst he could imagine - in fact had experienced - using the dark side so easily he could not imagine abandoning his fellow soldiers.

“It's odd you say that. I saw myself holding you as I did on Nar Shaddaa in a vision. Except I announced your death and Adele looked distraught. She had a vision whilst deep in meditation, sensed you were in danger. I've… I've barely seen her face express emotion before. Seeing her so upset when she sensed your pain was very strange. It was damn hard to track you down mind,” he explained.

His eyes were sad as he watched her struggle, felt the shame emanating off her. Yet he had to try and stay detached, observe her impartially and make an informed decision. As long as she wasn't faking the emotions he felt bubbling up, there was certainly a case for attempting to rehabilitate her.

“One way or another Kana, you'll never be going back to that life,” he promised. “You killed many then, in your time from the Order?”

 

[Kana Truden]

Saw her dead. Now that must have been something. Kana had always imagined what it would look like. Seeing yourself dead. Perhaps it was even stranger for her friend, the parole officer who had seen not just Kana being dead, but Kana pretty much being dead and then not dying. No time of death, no blood. Or well, loads of blood in a filthy alleyway on Nar Shaddaa.

Her wound still itched, still burned. Her back swayed slightly to the left, forcing her to cringe. Oddly enough, the thought of Adele showing emotion didn’t concern her. Perhaps it should have, but it didn’t. To her the previous lack of emotion had been a result of her being a ghost, and not having seen the ‘new’ Adele, well, obviously living people felt emotion.

At least those people you’d never actually met.

“Yes.” Kana grunted in response to the man’s question as her waist itched. “Not proud of it, but yes.”

“Self-defense mostly, or to exert myself out of a sticky situation. The amounts of death would boil down to how worked up I got, who I was facing.” Kana looked at Jacen still. “It worked, but the cost of it all... Well, I really don’t know that. Not sure I want to consider it either.”

“I turned into what I swore to destroy. I hate the irony in that.”

[member="Jacen Voidstalker"]

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]

Jacen leant forwards on the bench, placing one hand on his knee. He broke eye contact and looked out to the jagged obsidian mountain ranges that broke up the Sullust horizon.

He sighed before he said: "You do understand that you're going to be here for a long time?" he asked. "One way or another," he repeated in a distant tone.

"You've taken a step in the right direction. You feel regret for what you've done and I think you want to change. But this is the start of a long and arduous journey.

"This isn't an Imperial prison. We believe in rehabilitation, not permanent isolation. You'll push on through and regain the control you once had or...or you won't. Then you'll probably be staying here forever. Could be worse I suppose," he added "I can think of worse things than spending your time in the gardens here. Of course it might be somewhere in the middle. Might be we don't trust you to ever fight again, or go near the Sith, but you might be permitted to take some classes or learn to heal under Avalore."

 

[Kana Truden]

“One way,” Kana repeated solemnly swearing to herself she’d get out of here. “Or another.”

“I am not under the illusion that I have much sway in whether I get to leave or stay.” Kana nodded. “Not that I am sure I even want to. After all, I don’t have much to return to anyway. All things considered, the prison cell is the only thing I actually have.”

On second thought that one came off far more depressing than Kana had intended. Reassuring was the intention, but that felt anything but. She rose from her seat on the bench as two knights seemed to emerge from the shadows heading towards her and Jacen. She looked at Jacen and then the two knights. It was pretty obvious what came next.

“That sounds fair to me.” Kana agreed. “I’ll try.”

Not that there was any indication as to what she was going to ‘try.’ Try to be a nice girl? Try to think on things? Perhaps both were as close to reality as one would get at that moment. Truth told Kana probably didn’t know what she meant by it herself. It still felt rather weird to actually have some sort of structure again. Prison structure, but hell, even prison structure beat the life out of having quite literally no structure at all any day of the week.

She nodded her final farewell to Jacen before letting the knights whisk her away to life down under. Back to her cell, back to her memories. It would still take some time to truly consider all that she had done.

Which she did, for a while. People had come to visit and people had left. Some important, others complete strangers. Things were hazy at best still, time seemed to pass far slower in confined spaces that Kana would care to admit. She had her occasional trip to the surface for that vital dose of fresh air, but that didn’t last much longer than an hour at most before it was back into the cell again.

She didn’t speak, there was no need for anyone to know what she was thinking about. Nobody other than maybe [member="Jacen Voidstalker"], but he had special sessions for prodding around in Kana’s brain, looking at memories and how to cope with them. They still haunted her, but they were ever so slightly growing more and more bearable for each passing week.

Today was a special day. At least so she had been told. The weekly check-in had been changed up, apparently, for Kana to spend more time outside of her cell. She didn’t know what it was, all she knew was that she would be collected sometime around, well, now. Indeed, her perception of time had slowly begun to just fade away to the point where it was just another number to keep track of.

And in the bigger image of it all, she could contently live with not knowing what day, week, month or year it was anymore.

[member="Jacen Voidstalker"]

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]

The conversation on the way from the cell was typical for their mornings. He offered some general news from the wider Galaxy, she talked about where she felt she was with her progress. Yet today they weren’t heading for the surface. Instead they ended up in a wide, circular chamber not far from the prison.

The smooth, white walls were incredibly thick duracrete blocks. This whole wing was part of a wider bunker structure. They had only once used it, during the Final Order bombing of the facility. Most of the time whole regions were empty. If Kana was observant the numbers dark gashes that marked the walls and floor might have clued her in to this room’s main use.

Jacen casually tossed a silver cylinder over to her. “Bit of a change today,” he explained as he discarded his heavy outer robes. He deliberately didn’t explain that the lightsabre he had just thrown her was hard-wired to training mode and could do little more than bring up painful welts on the skin.

“I thought that perhaps you would like to blow off a little steam. Also, you can show me how much you’ve improved your self-control,” he said as he pivoted on one foot to face her.

 

[Kana Truden]

Cold, sterile, if Kana didn’t know better she would think they were in an abandoned hospital of a sort, but that hardly felt plausible. The gashes around the walls, the scorch marks. A weapons testing ground, perhaps, but no even that felt wrong. It was a practice chamber, though far more stripped down than Kana had ever seen one before. Jacen tossed something towards her. She caught the smooth metal hilt right before it hit the ground. A faulty catch had caused it to slip straight out of her grip and plummet towards the ground, but she caught it without much damage to anything but her pride.

Kana took a moment to get a better look at the tool in her hand. It felt weird to be holding one of these again. Kind of like a sudden case of phantom pain, only you can’t feel the missing limb because it was still there.

“This isn’t my saber.” Kana noted to Jacen before igniting it and giving it a whirl. “Didn’t think it would be this easy to forget what one of these felt like.”

She got into a shoddy stance. Single right hand on her hilt, feet at shoulder-width. Her left hand tensed up and curled up into a knuckle which she kept by her chest. She remained like that for a bit before easing up, swaying each limb from side to side in preparation for whatever it was that Jacen had in mind.

“So, what’s the plan here?” She asked. “A... Spar?”

[member="Jacen Voidstalker"]

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]

“Yeah why not, if that’s what you’d like to call me kicking your rusty arse up and down this chamber, sure,” Jacen replied. There was a mischievous smile on his face now. Yet that expression started to fade very quickly.

A few slow, deliberate breathes and Jacen had Centered himself. The hilt came up and ignited with the distinctive snap-hiss. His left foot slid forwards, never leaving the ground by more than a few inches. His weight dropped just a few inches, but enough to give him a stable base.

“Come on then,” he said quietly, wondering whether she would come at him or hesitate.

 

[Kana Truden]

“Pride comes before the fall.” Kana would respond with mocking calmness before she truly readied herself. “I should know.”

She took a step forward to place one leg in front of the other. This was the part where she did the tango again just like she had so many weeks ago. You didn’t go from expert to journeyman overnight. Or well, so the rumors were. Kana right now was feeling the rust grind against the metaphorical gears in her brain. She had chosen this ‘form’ so long ago, yet here she was stumbling on the execution.

Without further ado she thrust herself towards Jacen. Saber pointed for his chest she strove to pierce him right in the beatmaker.

[member="Jacen Voidstalker"]

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]

“Well said,” Jacen said quietly, holding his position. His mind was open to the Force now so that every sense fed his appetite for information. His limbs started to move before his consciousness caught up with what was going on.

With his golden blade already holding the centre ground, Jacen kept his footing firm to bring it across his body to push her saber out wide to his right. Deciding to stay on the defensive he took advantage of his advantage in reach. The tip of his blade carved a semi-circle in the air as he went from the block to swinging down at her left shoulder. As he did so he slid backwards to increase the distance between them again and move out of her reach.

“Getting a little slow sat down all day are we?” he asked.

 

[Kana Truden]

[member="Jacen Voidstalker"]

Oh she had forgotten that burn. Training sabers on skin and the brief smell that was associated with it. It wasn’t quite the same as the electrical discharge, that more or less sparked and felt like a bad cramp. A bad cramp that burned you alive, but a cramp nonetheless. No, this was like pure fire, and the burn lasted too. It was enough to be thankful that in the end all this would become was a nasty bruise on her upper shoulder.

“Quite.” She gritted her teeth.

No time to waste. She ran straight for the man without putting much thought into what her approach was supposed to be. She raised her saber by her side, let it seem like she was going for the obvious attack. Slashing once outside of the man’s reach in hopes of causing him to parry. Hand held by her hip she once more sought to turn him into a plasmatic barbecue stick.

One serving of Jedi Marshal Grande coming up.

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]

Jacen had to remind himself that even an out of practise Jedi Master was still an expert with the blade. Yet whilst his exterior was all bravado and mocking, inside he was exceptionally focussed. He had always trusted what his eyes told him about footwork, rather than the blade.

The subtle shift in weight was a little early. Kana needed practise. Yet the speed of the true strike took Jacen by surprise. He barely managed the block her blade catching his right near the hilt. All he could do was take diagonal step back to his left as he pushed her blade to the right. There was no chance for him to turn the momentum yet so he was kept on the defensive. What he was aiming to do was frustrate Kana and see if she could maintain her focus. Unfortunately she was probably a slightly better swordsman that he was.

 

[Kana Truden]

The attack was a success, technically. Swept aside, but not stumbling. Her teeth were still grinded, heart racing. The urge to win was slowly creeping up on her and with each second that passed she seemed to slip further and further into her competitive mood. Her eyes turned stone cold and tried to pierce the mind of her competitor. She had to know what he was thinking and she had to know it now.

It was an impatient approach, but it had served her well.

A few weeks ago to be precise. Not so much before that.

Wasting no time with her missed strike she grabbed the hilt by both hands. Saber rapidly held out above her head she sought to deliver a brutal overhead chop for his head.

[member="Jacen Voidstalker"]

 

[Jacen Voidstalker]

[member="Kana Truden"]

Jacen felt her brushing against the fringes of his conciousness. It wasn't as invasion as when he'd sense a Sith try the same technique. Instead it was a more passive attempt to read his thoughts. Just as he had spent many, many hours practising with Adele he reinforced his mental walls. A thick pane of solid, interlocking bricks that held her presence at bay. If she sensed the nature of this test it would rather influence the results.

The disadvantage of enacting an overhead chop with a saber was inherent in the angular momentum of the swing. With a massless blade no more force could be exerted than that required to halt the momentum of the strike. The downwards pressure exerted by Kana's muscles was also limited to her mass, unless she had tethered herself to the ground in some way. Jacen was more than capable of holding her weight overhead. Jacen's retreat was reversed and he stepped in close. Arms came up, string, yet supple enough to cushion the blow of halting that downwards strike.

The blades held together, interlocked. A myriad of sparks was sent tumbling across the plain stone floor. There was simply no physical way she could beat the strength he could exert upwards. Trying to shift her blade up he would suddenly close the space, moving in for a sudden shoulder to shoulder slam.

"Seems you were learning the wrong skills from that Sith Lord," he jibed.