Living On A Memory

[Lief]

Dust coated every crevice and surface in sight. Items lay strewn across the ground, once the belongings of some poor soul who had since been lost to the throws of Chaos. Each step she took kicked up a thick grey cloud which had her coughing into her hand. The main entrance had been a pain to open, now she knew why.

This place had not been touched in what looked to be decades.

Boots clacked against the tiled floor, the resonance rising as the high vaulted ceilings amplified each step she took until the room was alight with a cacophony of sound. Jyn winced. Loud enough to wake the dead, and that was most definitely not her intention.

Her gaze darted left and right as she left the entrance hall and entered a large atrium. Stairs skirted the left and right wall, though turbolifts were hidden within indents in the wall. Despite the scale, however, the actual furnishings seemed rather modest. At least, as far as she could tell.

Benches were set around in equal distances, made from wood no doubt locally sourced. When she ran her hand along the back of one she could tell the craftsmanship was high, it had a lovely finish. But there was no unnecessary flair, no decoration or ornate carving.

Some of them held discarded datapads, one a forgotten cloak... And another what seemed to be a lightsaber casing. A tight frown worked its way onto her face. Why had so much been left behind? Surely these were cherished by someone at some point?

She stopped to pick up the datapad. The power crystal still seemed to be in good condition as the device powered up instantly. Not even encrypted. Guilt coursed through her for but a moment as she read over the first few lines. This had been somebody's. She was reading someone else's work. Granted, it was just a deconstruction of the Jedi Code but still... Was this wrong of her? Was she prying?

Swallowing back her concern she kept hold of it and continued her self-guided tour. Up the steps, through the halls, then she stopped. Her skin began to prickle almost immediately, a tell tale sign of what was to come if she didn't focus... If she didn't disconnect herself from what lay before her. The sensation rose until it became almost painful, right on the edge, her cheeks flushed and her skin reddening just a little.

Her eyes closed quickly, blocking the sight from view.

Fight it, Jyn... Fight it...

But when she reopened her eyes, intent on turning away, she froze in place.

Bodies. Countless, decomposed skeletons lay before her. Piled together, there in the middle of the hall... Nameless individuals who had been forgotten, lost to time itself. It was enough to turn her stomach, though by some miracle she managed to suck in a breath to keep herself from heaving.

Her veins bulged, blood heating beneath the skin. Right on the edge... Ready to tip.

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

The stillness of this place was perhaps louder than any sound one might pick up, the absence of something that had once been present, an echo of what was and had yet since been silenced. There was a faint imprint on everything here: the walls, the floors, the dead mechanisms that lacked the power to open the doors they had been designed to guard. There wasn't a shattered ornament, scrap of cloth or piece of broken furniture that didn't speak, telling a story of those that had once resided here. In a place so naturally muted of sound, it all nonetheless was a symphony of lost tales.

Death had claimed this place for itself, an icy grip that had refused to relinquish itself, though the living might intrude.

The life that had long departed wasn't entirely gone, no matter what people might have believed. An empty and abandoned place, a shell of its former self, it was simple to imagine it a lifeless tomb, but few such places could whisper of a life once led. The people who had lived here were dust on the ground, irrelevant, forgotten, but their energies had imprinted upon their world, ethereal fingerprints that none could see, but some few might be able to detect. Thoughts, feelings, intentions, even actions - these had all left a mark. The struggle of conflict between the emotional and the rational. The desire to seek control over the self, that you might gain it over something more. The panic and rage that comes with facing the void and falling into it, your time on this world at an end. Oh, yes. It was all there.

The dust stirred into motes of lazy motion as the living walked here again, solitary and as lonely as those fateful spirits who had found their resting places set here with such utter finality. Perhaps it was true that all met their ends this way: trapped into their destiny with no ability to escape it, to be tortured by that inevitable realisation that all mortal lives ceased in such abrupt fashion. There one moment, gone the next, a mere memory cast adrift on the wind and soon forgotten. A sobering thought, but an apt reflection for a place that was more tomb than dwelling of mortal life.

A pale hand brushed gently along the smooth edge of an overturned table, transitioning along the cool stone surface with all the lazy urgency of a deep exhale. The Force existed even here, not bound simply into the solid molecules of the table, but contained within the very essence of the room. Someone sat at this table once, perhaps enjoying a meal, laughing with their friends, ignorant of what would come for them in time. The echoes of it were apparent, as clear to the sole mortal present as if they had been written in plain text scribbled onto a page of flimsiplast.

He'd known what this place was before it had even come into view. Only the foolish believed that the Force worked in mysterious ways: a means of describing their ignorance of something beyond their ability to comprehend. But the eddies and currents of that cold energy wound their way around this place in stark contrast to the softer flow that characterised the rest of this otherwise unremarkable planet. It had been obvious from the start: those who could touch the Force had been here, and remained. Nothing else could have created such an obvious convergence of energies. The energies of life, yes, but nothing living. Death had arrived before the being that now walked these halls. And life leaves no sharper impression on the Force than when it ceases to be.

"Now what secrets have you hidden here, Jedi?", he wondered outloud, the softest whisper issuing from between his lips, rhetorically contemplative. "I don't imagine any of you will be talkative in death, and save me precious time?", the figure added, a faintly-amused smile curving his lips, not reflected for even a half-second in those deep grey eyes that coldly surveyed the dead structure with dispassionate calm. "Always so stubborn, aren't you?"

No matter. He did not need a guide to find what they might have ferreted away. The Jedi had always been open in where they placed their facilities: the Galaxy knew where to turn to find their guardians. But not this place: not in any records I have found. The implications would be obvious: to conceal a place of learning suggested that they were concealing something they did not want known. Death erases your ability to stop your secrets being found, however.

Patience, therefore, was all that might be required here. A little time, and you'll spill your secrets. Death isn't sufficient to guard one from failure. Whatever had been hidden here would cease to enjoy solitude soon enough.

 

[Lief]

Her legs shook though she pried her gaze away to the left and forced her feet into motion. Keep going, Jyn... She couldn't buckle now, not after everything she had survived. The prickling was more of a nuisance than a pain at this point, the sensation beginning to retreat as she turned her attention to the contents of a new room.

A most wonderful sight greeted her. Large bookcases lined every wall and every area between them leaving just enough room to manuever between them. Rows upon rows, shelves upon shelves, stacks upon stacks, of tomes, datapads, datacrons... Her eyes lit up, and her previous disgust was gone. Left with naught save pure awe.

Though that flared the beast within her back into life. Damn it. Damn Arthos. Damn his actions. And damn her for being so weak.

She inhaled. Quietened her mind. And stepped inward to the room which held the aroma of age, of time, of knowledge. A treasure trove for the likes of Jyn. Her heart fluttered as much as she was want to let it. There was enough material in here to last a lifetime, and she could think of no better way to spend what remained of hers than with her nose stuck in the words of her predecessors.

Would there be something of her parents in here? The faces she did not know... Perhaps she would come to know them through their words. An unlikely event, but not impossible. This had been their project, after all, this Academy. It could not have been quite so old as it appeared, and yet it was deceiving all the same.

Jyn had seen little over twenty years of existence. This place had been built before she had breathed her first breath, but not much before then. It couldn't have been long before then.

What had happened to turn things on their head? Why the bodies? Why the discarded objects? So much lore lay here, ripe for the taking, and yet whoever had stacked the bodies had not thought to take it. What else had been left untouched? What else did this Academy hold?

"Did you walk this same path through these halls? Did you live and laugh and love... Hear your voices echo as I do my own?"

Clack, clack, clack went her boots as she moved further into the archive. The tomes looked old, older even than those she had found in the Silent Conclave, well used, well loved. She daren't even touch them though her eyes were attracted all the same. What she would give to feel free enough to read what was held within.

But this place was not her own. She was not here for what lay within. With a very pained sigh she settled the datapad she had collected earlier upon the shelves alongside the others. Would that time could stand still in this very moment...

She turned full circle once she reached what had to be the center of the room. Study desks, large armchairs, a speakers stand... Some sort of classroom? In her minds eye she could see it, hear it, come to life. Curious minds, inquisitive questions. A sense of longing from her core. What she would give to have spent time here during its heyday.

Finding a seat in one of the chairs, the young girl closed her eyes and simply breathed it all in. Asha Seren. Eli Lorr. Their project, their Academy, their home. Her home. This was where she was from. This is where she was born. What she would give to inherit it now, to see it returned to its former splendor even if she was the only one who ever saw it again. Even if it only served to teach just one student.

[member="Tirdarius"]

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

[member="[COLOR=rgb(235,235,235)][URL="http://starwarsrp.net/user/12685-th%C3%A9dus-lorr/"]Thédus Lorr[/URL]"][/COLOR]

This strange tomb, a place that looked as though it had simply been left as it was, it created many questions. That it had been built by Force Sensitives was obvious enough: the imprint of their presence could be felt everywhere, a simple impression that could not have been more obvious had it been written upon neon signs throughout the halls. They were Jedi, too, that was certain. Their tendency to only play with the limited Light left the taint of such everywhere they went. Death had been here, violence, yes, but even so, a sense of soft serenity permeated everything, a positive energetic signature that even those who could not touch the Force would have felt.

Still, there was much left unanswered: what had happened to the Jedi that had lived here? What was the source of the violence that had clearly taken so many of the lives that he could feel as having been extinguished here? Where had those aggressors gone, and why had they failed to take up occupancy of a place they had undoubtedly paid dearly to obtain?

That this place had simply been left empty of life was a puzzle he felt unlikely to solve any time soon.

Finding it hadn't proven to be difficult: the Sith had known that the Jedi had at least one hidden facility within the Corellia system, though they'd speculated it to be on the world of the same name rather than here on Talus. Nonetheless, the others must have found it and visited their usual brand of brutality upon it for this place to have been emptied. That would have come as no surprise: few among the Sith had the subtlety to imagine the Jedi a resource. Far too often they simply saw them as future victims, or past victories.

Tirdarius had clearly arrived too late to find the facility in any condition fit for the living: though the hallways and many rooms were nearly wholly intact, the absence of other Force Users nullified much of the usefulness of this place. A building is just a place, but those within...they have use. Any fleeting thoughts of finding the odd survivor of whatever had taken place here had diminished within moments. Nothing lived here. That had been obvious from the outset, that small flame of hope smothered before it might be kindled into something productive.

There might be information held here, perhaps even an artifact or two that might be salvaged, but it wasn't why he had come. Those hidden facilities the Jedi used often housed those more unorthodox among their ranks, those who might be amenable to compromise rather than battle, but it was clearly through battle that their lives had ended here. Though he did not know the circumstances, the Sith Lord could feel the waves of violence that had permeated through here: the remnants of violent death could be felt like a cold shiver running down the spine, lives extinguished in abrupt fashion in a flash of rage, frustration, fear. No serene deaths here.

Something crunched beneath the soles of his booted feet as he progressed further within. Shattered glass, perhaps knocked from its casing with a Force push, or perhaps blasted with an energy weapon. The cavernous room in which he stood was an antechamber of some kind, scorch marks here and there tainting the overall austerity, glass strewn about carelessly, fabric of robes left where the bodies wearing them had fallen, burned by lightsaber or blaster. No pleasant ends here.

The dark-robed Sith Lord shook his head, kneeling down next to one such pile of clothing, his hand hovering just above it, grey eyes lidded in thoughtful reflection as his senses extended outwards to take in what impressions he could. An involuntary shudder ran through him as a whisper of past events touched at his mind, clawing against his consciousness with all the subtlety of a Rancor barging through a wall. For beings so aspiring of oneness with the Force, you certainly resist it at the end, he mused inwardly. Sad that my brethren have always felt so compelled to hasten your journey there.

Another sharper impression struck at him as that thought passed through his mind, making him look up sharply. No remembered essence this: no, this was something present. The slightest wave of consciousness, the briefest of noises in a well of silence, a spark of light in a darkened room. This is not the empty tomb I took it to be, he thought, eyes narrowing even as his hand moved slowly to the hilt of the lightsaber resting against one hip.

He wasn't alone here. Someone else had come seeking out that which was best left to rest.

 

[Lief]

Her eyes drifted closed as she allowed the warmth of the room to seep over her. The armchair enveloped her like an embrace, dwarfing her in its colossal hold. A small sigh, contentment, was the only sound she made as she gave in to comfort and serenity for but a moment.

A moment was all she ever got.

Skin prickling, a tell tale warning. Force she hated this. She couldn't even enjoy the peaceful moments, so few that they were, when she finally found them. It wasn't fair. Tears prickled as she huffed with indignation. Why would she ever be given a break? It's not like the Galaxy had ever thought to be kind to her, not for one second. What did she expect?

Her teeth clenched, jaw tightening, as the pain deepened and the prickling turned to burning.

Stop it Jyn... Stop it.

But there was no one here to see the curse. No one around to worry or scare. She could be herself, she could give in to the beast which wanted to break free. Here of all places. The pain had been cathartic in the past, it wouldn't do to hold it all in. Everything she felt, everything she thought. Maybe it was best if she just let go...

No. You can't stop it when it starts... Let it go.

It would be so easy to just... Slip. Here amdist this room she could allow the flames to engulf her, safe in the knowledge that nothing would go wrong. Nothing could go wrong. She wouldn't wake up to find years passed without recollection, or find some poor soul stood over her with worry and fear and prejudice. Nothing. Nobody. So why didn't she?

Easy wasn't best.

Inhaling a slow breath she pushed it from her mind. All of it. The pain, the longing, the need... It was so very lonely, this way of life.

Her eyes finally opened. She looked straight ahead, and slowly lifted a hand. Her fingertips tingled with something else, a certain power she had not touched upon in so very long... Years. A decade, at least. She curled her fingers, summoning from the shelves one dusty tome. The heavy book trembled, threatening to fall every couple of feet as it swam through the air toward her.

Chaos, this was harder than she remembered. She could feel the strain, the muscles in her neck tensed as she increased her focus... And finally it landed in her outstretched hand. She huffed a breath. That had been a mistake. The Force was no friend to her.

[member="Tirdarius"]

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

Weapon in hand, though deactivated, the Sith stalked purposefully through those forlorn halls, infuriated perhaps that someone might think to disturb his time here and yet remain undetected. Perhaps the Jedi left this place under surveillance, assuming that the others would disturb it. A significant waste of time and resources, he would have ventured, but no doubt they had dispatched some sort of hunter to deal with the intruder. Perhaps I'll send their head back to the Order in a box. Remind them that the Sith are nothing to be trifled with.

It was a lesson he had thought they would have learned by now. No matter his philosophical differences with his brethren, there was still that reputation to maintain. Perhaps moreso, now that so many of our kind show little interest in acting as true Sith, he thought reflectively. Too caught up in their powers, too certain in their sense of entitlement and that absurd belief that power gave them the right to rule. Power alone is not sufficient, he reminded himself. What is strength without the wisdom to guide it properly?

Alas, the Jedi were similarly plagued by those who had stepped away from their mandate: now their role was to destroy the taint of darkness wherever they found it, as though such destruction could ever obliterate a force of nature. Each death simply strengthens those forces you would see gone, Tirdarius observed silently. You cannot destroy the Dark Side. Trying is what destroy you. He'd learned that sad truth from long experience. It wasn't something he thought to deny any longer. But someone else here needs to learn that tragic truth.

He wondered who it might be this time. Perhaps a Master, someone with the skills and mentality to be a challenge. Hopefully it wouldn't be another student or some recently-elevated Knight looking to establish their reputation with a lightsaber. All they end up establishing is that they weren't ready, the Sith mused. And so your legacy becomes another name in the Archives of the lost, and mine simply adds another unnecessary death to those I already claim, he thought, a soft sigh issuing from his lips at that. It was a failing of Jedi in modern times to simply leap into battle when encountering a Sith, never stopping to consider that maybe battle wasn't inevitable. Perhaps I'll let them live this time, if it comes to that. They might learn something from it.

Tirdarius couldn't help but think that unlikely, however.

"You can stop playing games, Jedi," he said outloud, wondering if his erstwhile hunter could hear him. Tirdarius could sense them within the building, though whoever it was all over the place emotionally, and that only served to distort the Sith's sense of their location. Probably means it's another damn Padawan, he noted to himself. They really don't learn. "If you came here to play with a Sith, do step out of the shadows you're hiding in so we can get this over with," he added, a touch of exasperation present in his voice. "I have better things to do than play Hide-and-Seek with you. And I'm sure the corpses around here wouldn't object to further company, if you insist on testing me."

Games were all very well and good - he was rather fond of them himself. But when they got in the way of his business, they simply weren't acceptable. To provoke a Sith was to trigger a fatal response in many instances, and if someone felt that he would be a pawn in their play time, they would rapidly discover this. Best if you turn around and run now, Jedi. Save us both the trouble.

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

 

[Lief]

It wasn't until she was two pages in to a tome detailing flora native to the Pacanth Reach that she felt it. A sickly swirling presence which seemed to choke the very air from her lungs and threatened to bask the room in darkness. Jyn held her breath. She had been so certain that she was alone, so set on her path to find out more that she had forsaken her own rules. She had not thoroughly searched, had not completely checked, and that had been her downfall.

Her mind had been obscured, but now she was more than aware. Darkness bred darkness.

She slipped from her chair and settled the book tenderly into the seat with a muted groan. What she would give to have a moment to herself. No, not even on some remote world, not even within what was quite clearly little more than a graveyard these days, could Jyn Sol ever find herself alone with her thoughts.

A shame.

One hand lowered to her belt, fingers brushing against the blaster which resided there. A primitive weapon, truth be told, but the only one she knew how to use. She flexed her hand, not yet calling it into action. No, that would be silly of her. She did not know who was here. Did not know if they proved a threat... Although their presence... Their presence suggested as much.

You cannot judge before you know... Well, you could but it never got you anywhere. Prejudices were dangerous. Especially when you got them wrong. She had done so with Krius, and that had been the end of poor Fuz. No, not again.

Slowly she crept across the room, grateful for the shelves which obscured her from sight, and listened.

A voice drifted from down the hall. Eerily familiar though she could not place her finger on the why of it. Jyn had nobody out in the Galaxy, the only voice she had heard on a frequent basis was Sargon, and he was busy back at the Temple. So if not Sargon, then who? The boy from Coruscant?

No. Not him. This voice was older, more composed... It lacked the doubt and the tremor of emotion that young Ar'ekk had shown.

Whoever it was believed her an Academy inhabitant. He had used the term Jedi. That almost made her want to laugh, though she knew the resulting pain would most definitely not be worth it. Instead she focused on her breathing, giving her mind a moment of respite.

Did he believe she had followed him here? This stranger who lurked beyond her door? That was a very presumptuous view to have... Still, it spoke a lot of the man even though she had no idea who he was. Referred to himself as a Sith, yes that fit with the general feel she was getting. Couldn't know for certain, though.

A couple of extra steps brought her to the door, her hand hovering over the keypad which would open it with a whoosh. What if death awaited her on the other side? Would she welcome it willingly, to find herself back with all she had lost, or would she fight?

Her fingers brushed the cool durasteel of her blaster. She did not wish to die this day.

She punched in the access codes, heard the door open, and stepped out into the hallway. The bodies were to her left. Thankfully the voice had come from the right. Her eyes narrowed as she peered through the darkness, and in the distance she could see the very faint outline of a body.

But alas Jyn was a coward. She could not find the strength within herself to take so much as a step further.

"I... I seek to test no man" she whispered, far quieter than intended, as her gaze fixated upon the figure. She was not here to fight. She was not here to mess with another's travels. Trepidation rose within her, hands trembling as she fought the urge to reach for the only weapon she owned. A dim glow emitted from around her, and she hissed against the burning sensation.

"Not again..."

Force was she growing tired of this nonsense.

[member="Tirdarius"]

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

A voice spoke, quietly, to such an extent that he could almost have thought to have been hearing things, but the Sith had far too much experience with sibilant whispers in the darkness not to know when one was real. No mind had touched against his, brushing upon those mental defenses in an attempt to find a way through. No, this was something real indeed, words spoken with gentle tone and hesitant inflection, though Tirdarius did not sense any threat intended behind it. Which does not mean there isn't one, he noted. Many a man steps forward with hand extended, only to stab you when he has come close enough.

His eyes flickered down towards the corridor from where the voice had originated, seeing a figure there where there had been none before. A surge of energy passed through him as he drew from the Force around him, pulling it into his cells and charging them with what he might yet need in order to survive and win against an unknown opponent. He could sense tempestuous energies flowing through the one that now faced against him, and could only guess as to how those might manifest themselves - there was a sense of impetuousity that spoke of a lack of discipline, but that perhaps could be unleashed in violent form. Tirdarius did not intend to be found unprepared for such.

The Jedi's hand moved towards their belt, perhaps reaching for the lightsaber that was their standard response to the presence of a Sith. Tirdarius' eyes fixed upon the movement for a moment, his own fingers moving softly along the metallic casing of the hilt he carried in his own hand, making it clear that he was prepared to meet force with some of his own. The other had not offered threat yet, but to reach for a weapon was a clear enough indication of intent. Moments away now.

"No being seeks out a place like this for idle purpose," he remarked coldly, eyes narrowing and his expression closing up in dismissive fashion. The Jedi spoke of not wishing to test him, but that seemed unlikely - their body language screamed defensiveness. And yet you sought me out. Perhaps you're recognising your mistake. "Enough have died here that one more will make little difference, if need be."

The other person started to glow slightly, their body manifesting light in a fashion common to some of the stronger Masters among the Jedi, when they drew strongly enough upon the Force that it suffused their cells in such a fashion as to emanate from their bodies visibly. The illumination was sufficient for Tirdarius to be able to tell that his opponent was female, though he could not make out her species or facial features. No apprentice, this, though, he felt certain. And yet the emotional leakage he sensed...that was very much at odds with the impression he had of the woman's powers as they were showing themselves.

"Have you come here to collect some absurd bounty, girl?", he asked her with a touch of disdain, as if to suggest that the very notion was insane. Although he knew of no such thing being placed on his head specifically, there were many interested parties who would pay to know that another Sith had been removed from the Galaxy, one less threat to their way of life. "If so, you might want to reconsider. I do not suffer fools gladly."

[member="[/COLOR][COLOR=rgb(235,235,235)][URL="http://starwarsrp.net/user/12685-th%C3%A9dus-lorr/"]Thédus Lorr[/URL]"]

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

A voice spoke, quietly, to such an extent that he could almost have thought to have been hearing things, but the Sith had far too much experience with sibilant whispers in the darkness not to know when one was real. No mind had touched against his, brushing upon those mental defenses in an attempt to find a way through. No, this was something real indeed, words spoken with gentle tone and hesitant inflection, though Tirdarius did not sense any threat intended behind it. Which does not mean there isn't one, he noted. Many a man steps forward with hand extended, only to stab you when he has come close enough.

His eyes flickered down towards the corridor from where the voice had originated, seeing a figure there where there had been none before. A surge of energy passed through him as he drew from the Force around him, pulling it into his cells and charging them with what he might yet need in order to survive and win against an unknown opponent. He could sense tempestuous energies flowing through the one that now faced against him, and could only guess as to how those might manifest themselves - there was a sense of impetuousity that spoke of a lack of discipline, but that perhaps could be unleashed in violent form. Tirdarius did not intend to be found unprepared for such.

The Jedi's hand moved towards their belt, perhaps reaching for the lightsaber that was their standard response to the presence of a Sith. Tirdarius' eyes fixed upon the movement for a moment, his own fingers moving softly along the metallic casing of the hilt he carried in his own hand, making it clear that he was prepared to meet force with some of his own. The other had not offered threat yet, but to reach for a weapon was a clear enough indication of intent. Moments away now.

"No being seeks out a place like this for idle purpose," he remarked coldly, eyes narrowing and his expression closing up in dismissive fashion. The Jedi spoke of not wishing to test him, but that seemed unlikely - their body language screamed defensiveness. And yet you sought me out. Perhaps you're recognising your mistake. "Enough have died here that one more will make little difference, if need be."

The other person started to glow slightly, their body manifesting light in a fashion common to some of the stronger Masters among the Jedi, when they drew strongly enough upon the Force that it suffused their cells in such a fashion as to emanate from their bodies visibly. The illumination was sufficient for Tirdarius to be able to tell that his opponent was female, though he could not make out her species or facial features. No apprentice, this, though, he felt certain. And yet the emotional leakage he sensed...that was very much at odds with the impression he had of the woman's powers as they were showing themselves.

"Have you come here to collect some absurd bounty, girl?", he asked her with a touch of disdain, as if to suggest that the very notion was insane. Although he knew of no such thing being placed on his head specifically, there were many interested parties who would pay to know that another Sith had been removed from the Galaxy, one less threat to their way of life. "If so, you might want to reconsider. I do not suffer fools gladly."

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

 

[Lief]

She couldn't control it. The burning, the pain, her eyes closed tightly as she felt even her iris' prickle knowing full well that soon the wonderfully blue hue would turn a disgusting shade of orange. She gulped down air trying her best to fend off the darkness. Not here, not now. She was no threat, she had never been a threat to anyone, but she had seen the expression of those who had been close when she had not maintained control in the past. Fear, hatred, she was a monster in the eyes of so many.

But she wasn't. Not really. Not deep down.

She sucked in the growl of pain before it could be released, and opened her eyes. They danced a sweet dance between the two clashing hues, causing her head to swim as the world before her became moderately disjointed.

He was speaking. That voice. Why did she know that voice?

Holding onto the sound of it, using it as a crux as an anchor she guided her mind away from the abyss and back toward... What? The light? There was no light here, not anymore. Death, destruction, chaos... Serenity. There was serenity too, back in the room, back among the books. She took a step back, toward the doorway, toward her new found sanctuary.

"I..." She swallowed, licking her dry lips before exhaling slowly. "I do not trespass in search of you."

The truth. Why was he disbelieving of the truth? Did he truly wish to believe he was the hunted? Or was it more than that... Paranoia? Was he on the run? Was he already being hunted?

No. This was the home of Jedi. A building of study, of worship even. And he was a Sith, desecrating the sanctity of the Academy with each step he took, each breath he breathed. And he believed her Jedi.

What other reason would he need to believe she meant him harm?

"No, no bounties..." Her head swam and she shook it to try and knock her thoughts back into kilter. She could feel the flames begin to rise through her, as though she happened to be stood upon a melting pot. "Please, I mean no ill..."

He wouldn't listen though. Wouldn't believe. At least she doubted he would. Her eyes dropped to his hands, noting how they hovered upon his waist. In the light she radiated she was able to see a shape. A cylinder. Of course, what was a Sith without their lightsaber? She groaned.

Not much use, her blaster, if it came down to it. Her hand dropped from her side. If he was going to kill her no amount of ammunition would stop him.

"Nobody should be here. I thought it was empty... Nobody..."

Her head turned, looking back to the bodies. Skeletons. She shuddered, and the room lit up with a lively glow that had Jyn sink to her knees. The previously held back growl made itself heard as she hunched over. Death, destruction, chaos. A physical manifestation of her life, it seemed.

Was her mother among the dead? Did her father lay there too?

She felt herself slip, lower and lower until the abyss swallowed her whole and all that she could see was red and black swirling in her vision. Where she lay her skin was ashen, the veins aglow with what could easily be mistaken for lava... Or something of the like. A high pitched ringing in her ear, the pain of a thousand heated rods pressing into her skin.

There was no coming back.

Her mind ran through all it had seen. All that she knew. Serenno, Phylis, the Tyrant of Panatha, Dromund Kaas, Korriban, Fuz, Tirdarius...

Jyn choked. Her mind whirred.

Tirdarius?

She mumbled through the pain, just one word, that one word... The voice she had heard, the voice which she knew. Tirdarius. Over and over.

[member="Tirdarius"]

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

Emotions flickered through the woman's mind, a blur of psychological essence, moving from one to another with little pause. Confusion, frustration, resignation, anger. Foremost among the sensations that he could detect: pain. No Sith would ever mistake that psychic signature. How could they? Most were taught it from their first days among the Sith, from themselves, from others. Pain was a strong motivator, prompting you to tap into your deepest emotions, to tap into the Force. Kesmas kash ty'k, he thought, recollecting on the ancient Sith: Suffering is strength. Without it, you would never know your limits, never push the boundaries of your inner self, never learn to become stronger than your pain.

It had always been a hard thing to learn, especially for the Jedi child that he had one been. Pain was a weapon of the sadistic, of people who found pleasure in the suffering of others, not a learning tool. If you can't teach with words or actions, your lesson isn't worth learning. The Sith had rapidly disabused him of that notion, and he had come to recognise the truth in it. Pain encourages you to face up to your own fight-or-flight. And cowardice is anathema to the Sith. The only way to transcend your limits was to stand up to the pain, embrace it, make it part of yourself and never allow it to stop you. Was that not what the Sith code taught? Through victory, my chains are broken.

This was something different, though: this was suffering without reason, a lesson being taught that he could not see. It seemed for his dispassionate perspective that her every breath was a fire running through her veins, paralysing her body and scrambling her mind. What few thoughts he could glimpse from her were disjointed, warped, lacking cohesion or focus.

It was this, and this alone, that removed any certainty he had that the girl was a Jedi. They were not the type to embrace pain in the Sith fashion, but they knew many techniques to push it aside, and were trained to press through it with a discipline of mind that any mundane being would lack. Their thoughts would be controlled, ordered, focused, pain shoved aside by that deep-seated serenity that was drummed into them from childhood. This girl had none of it: the pain was consuming her from the inside out.

Returning his lightsaber to his belt, feeling little need for the weapon at this moment, the Sith strode towards the girl as she collapsed to the floor, her body clearly lacking the strength to keep her upright as she struggled with whatever it was that harmed her. She had neutralised herself with no intervention from him, and any threat she had presented was no longer there to be concerned by. Only the agony that suffused her was of any concern now: the source remaining mysterious, a threat that might strike at both of them, not merely at her.

There was something familiar about her, but he did not know her. He'd known thousands, and so many faces were but half-remembered blurs to him now. It mattered little how they had crossed paths before, if indeed they had. I could always be mistaken on that point. The girl's blue eyes were clouded over with pain, her expression shifting between confusion and evident agony as she struggled with whatever it was that she fought with.

"You fight against the inevitable," he said dispassionately, standing over her and watching as the pain continued to make a persistant impression upon her. "All life is pain, in one form or another. Physical, sometimes, psychological, more often. The pain of loss, of disappointment, a lack of fulfilment, a burning need to do more than you have. All these and more," he continued softly, unsympathetically observing her with his deep grey eyes slightly narrowed.

"Here's your real sink or swim moment, girl: decide whether to ride the waves of pain and rise above them, or let them take you down beneath the depths and drown in it." The Sith Lord shrugged. No longer concerned about her emnity, she was an anomaly now, a curiousity to be observed, perhaps even an opportunity to be grasped at. Few Sith would walk away from an opportunity to craft a convert. "You learn your strength in moments of crisis. Do you have any to offer?"

This close, he could sense the Force swirling within her in waves, a constant stream that penetrated the cells of her body and moved in complex patterns that coalesced into consciousness and physical energy that kept her in one piece. There was darkness there, oh yes, he could see that. The pain radiating from her was the source of that: it was attacking her in body and mind, and the latter was spiralling towards the darker spectrum of emotions, the frustrated half of her that demanded outlet, like the child screaming in tantrum, in need of an emotional outlet. Through passion, I gain strength. She had plenty of that, it was certain.

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

 

[Lief]

Down.

She was falling down, deep into the depths of some uncharted abyss, trying so hard to make her way back to the surface, to keep herself afloat, while each breath seemed to burn as though she was swallowing hot ash. Drowning all the same though. Suffocating in the smoke which rose from the embers of her flesh.

She had to swim. Had to rise. Had to leave the darkness behind. She had lost so much the day her mind was splintered, the day she had been overwhelmed with more emotions than her little brain could handle. Now she could feel nothing. Nothing but pain. Anything else brought about pain. That was it. Her whole life reduced down to two things. Nothingness or pain.

And nobody could live with stoicism. It wasn't possible.

A small respite came in the form of a distant voice. His voice, she knew it so well now. But she couldn't speak, she couldn't focus enough, but she held onto it all the same. Tirdarius. He had saved her once, from a fate worse than death, now he stood over her as she felt the closest to the void as she ever had. Part of her wanted to fall over the edge. Part of her wanted to crawl back up from the pit and find herself before him like she one was. So long ago.

A lifetime ago, it seemed.

She couldn't though. She hadn't the strength. She had never made it out after falling so deep before, not until she fell unconscious and the pain subsided of its own accord. And if she did that there was no telling when she'd reawaken. In what state. All she knew was that he wouldn't be there when she did.

So that was it then. She had to find a way or risk losing him all over again. The only stability she'd ever known aside from Fuz. But he was gone... She could still hear the distinct pop which had accompanied his last breath.

A shudder ran through her.

No, anything but that. She didn't want to relive that moment again. She had done so far too many times, far too torturous. Something else, anything else.

But no matter which memory she clutched onto, there was no serenity held within. No peace, just turbulence. Waking up without recollection, so many years lost to her... Before that, her abandonment back on Teth... Before that Sith, Sith... More Sith. The Archer...

Hold onto that thought, Jyn. He was good to you. He helped you, taught you, if only for a short while... The knife thrower. He had been pleased with her aim. He hadn't belonged in a place like that, surrounded by darkness.

Further back still. To the Inquisition she so despised. Their paranoia had been so writhe that Jyn had never had a cats hell in chance of resisting it. The Imperium, Belkadan, so much death, so much misery...

Korriban. The Sith. To the beginning of her memories. Before that a hazy blur...

Nothing. There was nothing to cling onto. Nothing to ride back up to the surface. Just pain, sufferance, agony.

No. Not just that. Her memories flickered back to the man she had met on the cold desert world. Who had handed her his lightsaber and instructed her to gather her things. Who had taken her away from the darkness and into the void of space. Taught her to strengthen her resolve. Allowed her to be human for the first time in forever.

And then another, in his absence. The one who carried her back from the abyss his brother had put upon her. Who had taken her to some foreign world where the Force held no effect, and helped her slowly regain her strength. He who held the Universe within his minds eye.

She swam. She felt the pressure lift as she neared the surface. And with a laboured breath she broke the surface.

Her eyes opened. The orange which had taken hold began to recede, as did the embers of her skin. The pain dwindled with each breath she took, and the foggy haze which had set over her vision began to disperse. Leaving just one thing in her sights.

Could it truly be him? Or was this some other trick of the Force?

But it had to be. That voice... She knew it so well. So clearly. It had to be.

"Master..?" she breathed, as she exhaled one long breath and relaxed against the floor. Her skin tingled from head to toe and her head felt unbearably heavy, but she was awake... Somehow she hadn't fallen into the abyss. Somehow she had made it through.

[member="Tirdarius"]

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

The girl continued in her flailing for what seemed like an eternity, undoubtedly moreso to her than to the Sith that patiently observed, her skin suffused with a bright orange glow that practically seemed to burn away at her, a raging inferno that seemed prepared to consume her even though it entirely ignored him. It was not something he had ever observed before, and in that respect, her suffering was merely a thought-provoking exercise for the Sith Lord, an opportunity to learn of something he had never witnessed prior to this day.

Of course some of her suffering bothered him, as it always did. Compassion was not an emotion that many Sith tolerated, but it was something Tirdarius felt necessary to cultivate to some small extent. It was the downfall of many of his brethren that they failed to grasp at such a natural level of empathy, casting it aside much as they did the rest of their humanity in their quest for power. To feel anything but contempt for others was blasphemy to them, other beings existing solely to be used and discarded. It was a blindness he had never cared to contemplate: to do so was to create a vulnerability far greater than such emotionlessness was likely to protect against.

He would not help her, of course. That was not the Sith way: if he intervened in some way to reduce her suffering, or perhaps even find a means to cure her of whatever mallady ailed her, she would never learn to conquer it herself, and would thus only ever stand dependent on the benevolence of another. That can hardly be tolerated: for the weak to rely on the strong is understandable. But to push aside an opportunity to grow strong yourself is a crime. Perhaps she would remain this way for hours, days, maybe even weeks. She would struggle through it and survive, or it would kill her. Either outcome was hers to decide. Tirdarius would not intervene.

The glow on her skin began to fade, and as his eyes observed that change, he sensed more within her: a return to a level of consciousness that had been denied her. Like fog parting as the rays of the sun shone through them, the mist that was enshrouding her mind began to dissipate, offering clarity that had been momentarily absent, but also revealing her to watching eyes in that same moment. That which hides the world from us often serves to hide us from the world. Her pain had been more than sufficient to achieve that same effect for her.

That same clarity offered insight that had otherwise eluded him at that moment. Her mind carried echoes of pains that she had carried with her like a weight on her shoulders, never a moment of rest from them. The mental scars that rested upon her soul were evident enough in the weariness he could see in the electric blue of her eyes, resigned to the fate that continued to take a toll from her even as he'd stood there watching.

She breathed a word then, exhaled it with that self-same fatigue he could see in her expression, her choice of vocalisation no cry for help, no request for respite, no declaration of her frustration or anger at being rendered so helpless. No, it was a question, but also a recognition: identification of a being that remained a memory in her mind rendered in the flesh. And few enough have ever thought to call me that, he reflected. Perhaps her confused mind was reaching for someone that was not here.

Even so, there was something about her that did seem familiar. Her thoughts were easy enough to gain a sense of: she projected them loudly enough, asserting insufficient control to keep them to herself. He could see an image of himself standing before her, but stranger still, the sense that he had done that before. Not our first meeting, then. Strange that this should be so: he didn't recall any meeting between them. He'd have remembered those eyes, and he'd certainly have recognised anyone afflicted with so strange a condition as hers.

"You confuse me with another, girl," he said cooly, dismissing her impossible assertion with all the calculated disdain of a Sith Lord caught in an odd situation. "Not unsurprising, given the disorder in your thoughts. Breathe, and focus yourself," he instructed her, folding his arms across his chest with a rustle of soft black fabric. "Your mind will cease being muddled in due course."

Her recovery would no doubt take a few moments. Such an odd set of circumstances: to find her drawn to this Jedi facility, afflicted by a malady he'd never observed before. Perhaps she had thought to find a clue to a cure within their Archives, or perhaps even had thought to imagine that the Jedi still resided here, and that they might help her through what ailed her. A sad reality she returns to, if so, he reflected calmly. But no doubt the erstwhile Healers of their Order would work themselves into exhaustion to find answers for her. There was little reason to imagine that Sith medics would have done the same: chances are that she would be turned over to the Lords for study and experimentation. And so what do I do with you now?

"Now tell me: what are you doing here?", he asked, wishing for confirmation of an answer either way. That she was Force Sensitive was obvious as her hair colour, but that alone would not explain how she found her way here. Even he had struggled to locate it, doing so only after days of patient study. "If it is not me that you sought, then what, or whom?"

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

 

[Lief]

That one word had taken from her all the strength she had just gathered together. So much struggle, strife, for nothing... He didn't sound impressed, no recognition in his gaze, instead he simply dismissed her as some delusional girl. Though even knowing that he did not simply leave her there to suffer. Breathe? Had she really forgotten how to do such an intrinsic task?

She blinked several times, and as she inhaled a slow breath her vision cleared. But she must have been wrong. Still delirious. She had to be. Because the face above was most definitely that which belonged to her Master.

Yet he did not recognize her. Not in any regard? That had her frowning. Now that her breathing was back in its steady rhythm she finally found her head light enough to lift and sat upright. Pushed back, so that she rested against the wall. So cold, enough to rouse her further.

He asked her a question, and she simply stared at him dumbfounded. How many years had she spent in search of him? Any hint she could find... So few that they were, especially for one such as she. A nobody in the grand scheme of things. Who would give a vagabond such information? Who would speak it in a place where such critters could hear?

"Master..." she said again, with a little more certainty and just a touch of doubt. Her brows furrowed together, his name on the very tip of her tongue yet incapable of making itself known. Her mouth felt dry, yet in contrast her hands were clammy. She wiped them on her trousers, and felt dust stick in place of sweat. That had her grimacing.

The question. What was the question? She shook her head, before pressing one hand to her temple to steady the swaying inside her mind.

Further breathing, focused to a point, allowed her to lower her hand back to her side and recall his words. What was she doing here? What sort of question was that? What was he doing here? She at least had cause, had reason...

"My past..." she responded, "My parents..." What should've been but never was. Her gaze drifted back to the bodies, further tingling, only... She knew they were not among the dead. She did not know how she knew, but she did. Another breath and the sensation died down almost immediately. Sargon's teachings had been much easier to consume when they were wrapped up on a world that held no connection to the Force. No doubt with time she would become as efficient at keeping the beast at bay out here in the real Galaxy.

"You..." she said, eyes narrowing just a little as though she was seeing him clearly for the first time, "I was looking for you. But not here... No, Teth..."

Teth had been so long ago, though. Moira, Fuz, the empty bunker. No Tirdarius in sight. Not even the strange woman, that Kyros, who had brought her sister to her then so quickly taken her from her sights. Just Jyn and her thoughts until Moira arrived.

"It is you... Isn't it?"

She tried to stand, pushing up from the ground only to slump back down a second later. Force, why did she feel so strange? She'd never 'survived' the beast when it reared so violently before... Is this what she should come to expect each time she managed to subdue it? Truly she hoped not.

"Tirdarius..."

That was his name. And when she said it all uncertainty was gone. It was him. Time may have changed her, but he remained the same immovable force. But what was he doing on a world like Talus? There was nothing here of note...

[member="Tirdarius"]

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

His name passed her lips and rendered him momentarily speechless at that. Very few ever cared to utter it, and certainly he had not expected such to come from a girl of her age. That she had referred to him as her Master was something easily dismissed as a delusion: the absence of discipline within her mind had cleared that up for him rather rapidly. She'd not received formal training, or at least nothing of note. Her emotions wouldn't have been all over the place if she had. The idea that she had a Master was laughable, to say the least.

But yet, she knew his name. He had a handful of aliases used to deal with those outside the hierarchy of the Empire, but very few knew that moniker he had adopted when giving up his birth name and accepting his fate as Sith. Someone of this girl's nature should never have had cause to know his name, much less be able to identify him on sight. Something is not right with this. And he disliked mysteries of that nature.

Reaching down, his pale slender fingers curled around her arm, a momentary application of force being sufficient to haul the girl to her feet. He pushed her backwards to stand immobile against the wall behind her, grey eyes looking at her searchingly, seeking for some insight into a puzzle that needed resolving if he was to work out what to do with her.

"Don't think to resist, girl. This will hurt rather considerably if you do," he informed her with a cold, dark tone that carried considerable threat with it. He did not intend to hurt her, since she was no threat to him, but Tirdarius had to know, and he doubted her incoherent thoughts would allow her to piece together words sufficient to that purpose. Not that you need to speak for me to learn your secrets.

He pressed a hand against her forehead, sending his mind seekingly into her own. It was not often he engaged in a Memory Walk, but this seemed an opportune time to do so. That she might resist him was of little consequence: he doubted she would be capable of summoning the strength of will to do so, and even that perhaps would have proven insufficient. I need to know how you know me, he told her, projecting his thoughts telepathically into her mind, even as he probed her mental defenses and pushed against them.

A pause existed between them as energy flowed between the two, passing from the Sith Lord into the victim he had pinned firmly against a wall, then images began to flow, no doubt passing before her eyes even as they were exposed to his thoughts, a shared experience that neither would escape from until he was ready.
Korriban, a world he had fond memories of. Here, he had trained, recognising the dusty sands beneath his feet, the dry heat of the air that burned the lungs, the dark shiver of fear that penetrated the soul with each breath. He saw it now through her eyes, felt a jolt of recollection, a well-remembered fear and sense of vulnerability. A small primate, covered in fur, and accompanying feelings of pleasure and familiarity at its presence in a place that was far too inhospitable to life, even though it existed here in dangerous abundance.

More than that, though. A darkened cave, memories of words spoken to her in curious tone. An affirmation that her suffering had purpose behind it. A departure from that dark world aboard a cold starship, taking her to a more verdant world, among beings suspicious and perhaps even paranoid. Watching a familiar black-robed figure weave his way through it all with a casual disdain, conversations with that person in both comforting and confusing fashion.

Standing in stillness close to the girl, Tirdarius' eyes narrowed, his lips thinning in obvious recognition. Oh, yes, she knew him: her mind was recalling conversations they had engaged in, prompted by more recent identification, and he was seeing himself through her eyes. And yet it wasn't quite right: within her memories, she was looking up at him, when now she stood far taller, a different perspective evident to her eyes.

He removed his hand from her forehead and took a half-step backwards. He knew all he needed to: that sense of shared past had not been a delusion on her part, and he at least now had an answer for why he mind was in turmoil. It often was, when she was but a child. They'd parted years ago, but it was clear enough that those years had not been as kind to her as he had hoped. Removing myself from her path was a means to break her free of the cycle of violence that always follows us. If her memories were not illusions in and of themselves, perhaps he had failed in that.

"You no longer look as you did, girl," he remarked softly, noting once again that her eyes were blue when once they had been purple, as he recalled. There were other changes, too, of course: she was taller, no longer a child, and her hair had lost some of the tints that she had once worn. The psychological differences were more profound, though: even with her conflicted mind and tortured thoughts from childhood, he had never known her lack composure in the way he had observed in her now. "Though you certainly blend in better than you used to," he added.

She had spoken of her parents, too, but to his recollection, she hadn't really known them. Something else you learned in the intervening time, then? Perhaps they were Jedi after all - it would have made a certain sense, though why they'd have abandoned their daughter to the mercy of the Sith, he suspected neither of them would ever learn. Perhaps for the best, unless the absence of such knowledge renders her incomplete. For some reason, Tirdarius didn't imagine that overly surprising.

"I suppose that renders one search complete," he remarked calmly, with a trace of irony in his tone. To have looked for him and then found him in a moment where she had not intended to was amusing, but the Force did so enjoy playing such games on those that could use it in turn. "Had you envisioned what you would do, or did you not imagine yourself to be successful in finding me?"

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

 

[Lief]

She blinked up at him then squinted as she saw a slight amount of disbelief pass over his expression, felt his shock and could practically hear the whirring of his mind as he tried to figure out how she knew his name. So very long had passed since Teth. So much had happened to alter the girl she had been, as inquisitive as her monkey, and not just in a metaphysical sense either. The realization of who she was at her core, of the spell she had been put under by the Tyrant of Panatha had left her with a complete physical overhaul. At least in the details that most took for granted. Most notably her eyes... From purple to vibrant blue, no doubt like her parents.

Feeling the full weight of his gaze, Jyn could not help but press herself further back against the wall in secret hope that it would fall away to give her more space to maneuver. To flee. He may have been Tirdarius but that did not necessarily mean he was the same man he had been all those years ago. It did not mean that he would care about what had once been. On the surface, especially with the beast so recently risen within her, she was weaker now than she ever had been as a child. There was a subtle irony in that which was not lost on her.

Then again, what had there been after Tirdarius? Nobody had stepped forward to help, not that she would have even permitted them to if they tried, and Jyn wasn't even on speaking terms with the Force. No way to train, no way to grow, she had cut herself off from that the day she forsake the Force. Not a single attempt at using it, not until Arthos forced her hand. She swallowed down the choke which accompanied that thought before it could become anything great, and pushed it aside. He did not deserve her thoughts, that heartless monster who somehow sported two. Twin hearts, yet as cold as they came.

Inhaling through her nose, and tightly closing her eyes, she instead allowed herself a moment of revelation. Had she not utilized the thing she so despised this day? It had been difficult, to be sure, but she had managed it. She hadn't died. Hadn't suffered. Too little too late, though. No time to train, to grow, to make up for lost time. No, her past had already caught up to her. And no doubt her Master - Former Master? - would be unimpressed with her progress. That hurt more than any amount of pain her curse could bring her. She had never wanted to disappoint him.

She was snatched from her thoughts by the grip which enveloped her upper arm, and in a heartbeat she found herself upright and pressed against the wall. Instinct bade her to struggle, a slight growl escaping her lips that she couldn't quite hold at bay... Though she regretted the sound almost immediately and winced at her own stupidity. She was not an animal. Not some wild creature who had to resort to so base a reaction when cornered. It didn't matter though, he didn't release her.

Looking up she was met with the sharp grey of his eyes, and felt a shiver travel down along the length of her spine. His expression stern and set. He still didn't know, didn't remember, didn't trust that she of all people could know who he was. And how could she blame him? Jyn was nothing special, she did not radiate power or strength or serenity or promise in any regard. Quite the opposite in fact. It helped her slip among the ordinary folk, allowed her to pass by undetected as she traveled aimlessly and alone like a vagabond, but in the eyes of a man such as he... In the eyes of the one who had been her Master... she must have seemed little more than pitiful.

The pit in her stomach seemed to only expand, and she found herself unable to keep his gaze. Instead she looked down, toward her feet, and even as he spoke all of the previous will to fight was gone. Next thing she knew his hand was pressed against her forehead, making her even more immobile than she already was, and... She clenched her eyes tightly closed as a sensation washed over her mind. Her heritage meant little, had always meant little, given the way her mind worked, and so effortlessly her memories were brought back to the forefront of her mind. Not necessarily painful, but most definitely discomforting.

He had said something, straight into her mind the way he had always been want to do, though she couldn't quite focus enough to realize what it was he sought. Though she had her guesses. Her brain whirred into action, tossing up everything that had to do with the two of them, their connection. Korriban, Belkadan, Atrisia, Teth... So much in so short a time that she felt as though her head might explode under the pressure. She saw it all through her own eyes, not just him but all the others they had encountered too. Including Fuz. Grief washed over her to the recollection of her beloved companion, his death still weighed heavy on her soul.

A slight whimper passed through her lips, the process feeling like it was never going to end. Her head throbbed, and she felt her knees weak with only his hold on her keeping her upright. Please let go... Please let go... It was unbearable, and still it continued on. Still she was kept there against the wall while an entire section of her life was flashed before her eyes. Was she about to die? That's what happened, right? Before you went, you saw everything...

Without warning his touch was gone and Jyn was left to slump back down to the floor, head hung under the weight of all that had been witnessed. When had she become so weak? There was a time that she had been so much stronger, shortly after Teth. None had been able to get to her, to break through the walls she had constructed. Why had that changed? Where was the rebellious teenager these days? Gone. With Fuz, with her serenity, with her will to... Anything. Instead all she felt was an intense fatigue. It would have been easier to give into it, but she didn't. Wouldn't.

He remarked on her changes, and she couldn't help but laugh. No humour though. With a small sigh she finally reopened her eyes to look up at him, as small on her knees as she had been when they'd first met. Where had the time gone? She wanted to speak as freely as she once had when it was just the two of them, but she knew that times had changed too drastically for her to slip back into that self same path. He wasn't likely to want her anyway. She lifted a hand, pushing aside strands of hair which obscured her view, and huffed a breath.

Strength was returning to her now. To her body, to her mind, and she found herself able to stand tall before him. No longer cowering, no longer pitiful... Well... Less so, at least. Oh, who was she fooling? She still felt like a child, even if the height at which she saw him from was changed. Somehow she managed to resist the innate urge to fidget and forced her hands down to her sides instead. Gaze lifted, meeting his own. A stubborn set to her jaw.

"I did not think it possible to find you" she said, shifting her gaze just a little to glance him up and down, top to bottom, before refinding his eyes. Another urge to step back, only she was still set against the wall. Nowhere to go, Jyn. You have to face this one. She swallowed back her doubt, and did her best to fight back the sting of tears as relief instead washed over her. It really was him. After so very long he was here... But neither had purposely sought the other, so where did that leave them? So much time, so much change... Yet she was rendered the same helpless child before him all the same.

She had come here in search of her parents, but here stood before her the only man who had ever come close to that. Not that he'd appreciate that knowledge. No, that was something she'd most definitely be keeping to herself. "I gave up trying" she lied, a little too smoothly for her own good, as her hands sought her pockets in place of their usual fidgeting. Would he know? Would he care? Her gaze dropped again, the set of her jaw changing just enough to hint at a frown. Curse the Force for doing this, for toying with her in so cruel a fashion. As if it hadn't done enough to destroy her, to test her, to break her, now it was going to throw her back into the path she had sought for so long... A path she doubted she would be permitted to resume.

[member="Tirdarius"]

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

A soft, humorless laugh escaping him, Tirdarius offered a shake of her head. The girl knew better than to lie to him, or so he thought, but perhaps it had been too long since they had crossed paths for her to recall her habit of projecting her emotions outwardly, loudly, for anyone sensitive enough to hear. It had never been her fault, as such: he had known her as a strong empath, and such beings always struggled to block their own connection to others. Easier by far to leave oneself vulnerable, in the hope that it allows others to lower their guard. He'd always found that amusing: to have found a girl such as her among the Sith, beings who so often purged away empathy as a matter of course.

She'd suffered similar treatment at their hands, of course, and had sought refuge of a sort, fearing correctly that the Sith would only hurt her more to mould her to their path. She might have flourished among the Jedi, he thought now, much as he had then, but such had not been the fate that the Force had in store for her. Admittedly, to simply take Jyn and leave her among the Jedi would have been simplificity itself, but to do so would only have guaranteed her end when the Sith finally caught up with her. They did not tolerate deserters, nor had a habit of being lenient with Jedi.

His solution had been something very different, of course, and one he knew he had left incomplete, but clearly she had benefited by it in one fashion: she remained among the living, when she otherwise would not have. The girl would never have survived traditional Sith training, and his own unique brand of it was not something she had been ready for. That much he knew he had never told her: the Sith did not train children. Not the way that the Jedi did: to burn away their attachments, weaving a dedication towards the Force and their duty. The Sith felt this absurd: to sever one's bonds to that which you held precious, you alleviated inner suffering, turmoil, the pain that so many of them drew upon. And it severs you from your humanity, which is so essential in a Sith.

Jyn had not been ready for it, not then. The juvenile girl he had remembered was now a young woman, however, one that had suffered far worse than he had imagined that she would, but alive and here, for all that. Perhaps the Force had pushed her once more into my path, that we might finish what we started, he mused, his lip curling in amusement at the thought. The Force is not, as they say, without a sense of humour.

"Whether that's true or not, it's also irrelevant," he informed her calmly, continuing to watch her with that unflinching stare that had long ago become a habit. "I once told you that you had to navigate your path your own way, and come to decide which path you had to walk," Tirdarius continued, his tone remaining placid, that slightly lecturing quality remaining present as it so often had between the two of them. "Nothing has changed in that respect."

That she was here spoke of her conflicted nature, the same as it had always been for her. Torn between so many different paths, never certain of where she belongs. Perhaps it had been naive of him to imagine that she would realise that belonging was always a matter of how you felt within, rather than finding acceptance without: so many often attributed their choice of path to the people around them, or to a place, saying naively that they belonged in that time and place. It was a lie: belonging only comes from within, when a being acknowledges their own nature and chooses not to fight it any longer. Part of the reason so many of my Sith brethren are animals: they started out as such, and finally learned to embrace it.

Part of him felt bad at killing them for it, but such things needed to be done if the Sith way was to survive.

As for this one, she had always struggled with it: not remembering her parents, torn from her life and left to rot among the Sith, beings who would have destroyed what she was in order to force her to become something she was not - as, perhaps, the Jedi would have done, in their turn. Her fate had changed when he had ripped her away from the others, allowing her the luxury of choosing another path when they would have only otherwise permitted her the choice of death, but perhaps in doing so, he had but cast her adrift. Finding her now...it seemed that current had carried her here. To what end, he could not say, but the irony did not escape him.

"Not many beings in your position have been given your choices, girl," he remarked cooly, even though he doubted she would see that as a positive thing. But that's always how it starts. Very few who chose the Sith path did so because they were leading happy, comfortable lives. Suffering is how it starts, and how it frequently ends. "But I see you're still trying to make a true choice, and embrace that in full. Do I once more have to push you in a particular direction, or will you grasp at the consequences and choose for yourself?"

 

[Lief]

She stiffened to the laugh and bit the inside of her lip to keep from verbally lashing out. That's the way she had been for a while, her coping mechanism, but it wouldn't do to act bratty infront of this particular man. It wouldn't work here as it did out on the streets, where weakness was your sole undoing which beings sought to exploit. There the blaster had become her best friend, though she'd never really had cause to use it as the mere sight of it seemed to fend off most. But here... No, he would not like it if she waved a weapon around or said something she shouldn't. Something she didn't mean.

Fight off that instinct now, Jyn... You don't need it anymore. She hadn't needed it in some time, truth be told, but she kept a tight hold on her blaster all the same and refused to part ways with it. She had never owned a lightsaber, never even tried to use one, the Force wasn't a thing she catered to, and vibroblades were so messy. Besides she had been a crack shot ever since her supposed upbringing on DK. Was any of that even real? Had she ever lived among the Sol's? Chewing her lip she pondered on that for a moment longer than was necessary, before sighing.

"Okay so maybe that isn't true... And maybe it doesn't matter either way. But I wanted to stop searching." The truth of that stung and she winced just a touch before schooling her expression. It doesn't help anyone, clinging onto the past, but I did not know how else to exist if not within his shadow. I never truly lived until he took me from Korriban... And then she had all but died in her abandonment. In fact, death would have been a far kinder outcome. "I don't... I don't understand. Did I do something wrong?"

She had awoken to find him gone. No trace, no word, no explanation. Nothing. Alone with the damned Sith. And then they too moved on from Teth, leaving her alone with just a monkey for companionship. It had all been downhill from there, as if it hadn't been already. She felt her skin prickle yet again as indignation rose within her, and as much as she wanted to be able to flare up she knew it was futile. It would end in pain, then darkness, as it always did. Instead she huffed a breath and let it go.

"You think that it was a choice I sought? I was a child, I didn't know which choices I had. I didn't know the options. All I knew was that I didn't want to be among the sadistic Empire. Anything was better than being there. When you left the only choice I had was to fight or to die. And I don't mean that in some grand poetic philosophical way." Her gaze hardened just a touch, before she looked away from him. Had he seen her then he may have been a little... Proud? She had definitely strengthened her mind, body, her resolve... Nobody was breaking down those walls. Nobody was reading her thoughts or emotions.

"What are my choices? Tell me! Which paths do I get the privilege of walking through this stupid Galaxy?" Her skin flared up and she could feel a tremor to her jaw as fury boiled beneath the surface. Did it even matter? Did she have to throw a label on it? Couldn't she simply exist as Jyn?

[member="Tirdarius"]

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

[member="Thédus Lorr"]

His lip curled at the girl's outburst, though whether in amusement or derision, it would have been hard for any to say, given that it was the most emotive that Tirdarius ever tended to get, at least outwardly. That she was angry at him came as little surprise: he supposed he might have felt the same way, if someone had chosen to walk out on him at that age, as he had with her. Jyn hadn't understood the dangers that gravitated around a Sith Lord like himself: she had seen the Sith in terms of herself, but those that she had dealt with would never have been a threat to Tirdarius. The type of enemy he might attract would have swept her aside like a leaf on a breeze, and far less gently.

The rage that was buried beneath the surface of her mind was simply a bonus: though Tirdarius had never had much use for that level of emotive force, his own Master had trained him well in the methods needed to exploit it, or to teach another to harness it. We all have our strengths, and the means to use it to draw upon the Force. Perhaps Jyn has finally found hers. Whether she could sustain that, and direct it as the Sith did...well, that remained to be seen.

"You never did understand how dangerous it was to be by my side," he remarked, leaning back against the wall that rested just behind him, folding his hands together in front of him in a contemplative gesture, his eyes flickering away from her. "Truth be told, you simply weren't ready to walk my path, and doing so would have killed you," the Sith continued bluntly, not bothering to conceal his thoughts in the circumspect way he so often did. "Ours is not a peaceful path, though it should be. Violence finds us, and that is the least of our dangers. You would have found yourself corrupted by a darkness you were not ready to face, and it would have done far worse than simply kill you."

Initially he had but intended to try to remove her from the path of his fellow Sith, to shield her from their brutal ways until she could learn to protect herself. Her youth and naivete had put a damper on that plan, as did her inherent distrust of the Force: she could not give herself to it, and thus had little chance of coping with what the Sith might throw at her when finally Tirdarius drew her back into their circle, as he knew would inevitably happen. A mistake to imagine that a child might prepare herself to do what she must to survive. You simply weren't ready, girl.

And so he had left her. To survive, yes, and perhaps bereft of support, but at least secure in the knowledge that she might have precious time. The others would not bother with her if she failed to cross their paths again - an inevitability, had they remained together. Obscurity was her safety net.

"As for what ails you..." he nodded at her, noting once again that her skin was once more taking on that fiery glow which seemed to accompany her outbursts. "Had you thought that ignoring your powers would somehow be safe?" The Sith Lord shook his head, wondering at how it was that she could have remained alive and yet ignorant of the gifts that the others had unlocked in her, though he doubted she had realised it. "Darkness touched you from a young age, girl, and it is not something you ever rid yourself of. We Sith have only one choice: embrace that darkness, or be consumed by it."

Her lack of inner discipline had been obvious even when he had not known who she was: it was clear enough that she had not pursued training in her powers since they had parted. Impossible to teach you as you were, but now perhaps you have little choice, he reflected. If she did not get a handle on the energies that played through her consciousness, they would kill her. And perhaps a great many more than merely herself. He'd seen several mentally-unstable Force users succumb to such over the years, unable to control their powers and falling deeper into their insanity as the darkness ate away at the remnants of their sanity. It was a mercy to end their lives quickly, compared to what might have happened otherwise. Perhaps Jyn approached that precipice.

After all, it was always her fear that had been her biggest danger: fear of the Sith. Fear of the Darkness. Fear of herself. The anger she now displayed was something new.

"I told you when you were but a child: we do not get presented with choices. We must make them for ourselves. When you do not see a choice you like, you use your strength to craft a new path." He turned his head slightly to stare once more at her, his voice becoming slightly sharper in timbre, even as it softened in volume. "To do anything less is to force yourself into a corner you cannot escape from."

Perhaps it was such a thing that had pushed their paths together once more: Jyn at the precipice, unsure whether to embrace her fate and fall over it, or to try and escape it in some fashion. All that remained to determine was which choice she wanted to make, and what his role would be in facilitating it. Perhaps all I can do to end her suffering is take all choices away from her, he thought, wondering if he could truly extinguish her life. Certainly not with the same ease I did with those others, though she would not fight it as they did. He knew that without doubt. But that may yet not be necessary.

"You have had time to decide for yourself what you wish to do, girl," he reminded her, not unkindly. One thing their parting had ensured was that she would have to figure things out for herself, absent his guidance. Perhaps even to find her way back to the Sith, or to the Jedi. Or to live a life without us, away from all that comes with it. The options had always been there for her: he had at least ensured that she had that choice, if not those she might have wanted for herself. "Your path has always been yours to determine. So which way will you go?"

 

[Lief]

"I knew full well the dangers" she all but snapped, her hands fidgeting within her pockets, to distract her from the bubbling rage she housed within, to keep her from spilling over into more turbulent territories. In the eyes of the Sith both she and Tirdarius were deserters, and while they likely would not have openly stood against him she was little more than a standing target. "I just didn't care for them."

Maybe that was foolish of me though. I wasn't only putting myself in danger, but my presence likely slowed him down too. Something else to watch out for... Nobody likes a burden at the best of times, much less when they were hunted.

Exhaling ever so slightly, Jyn could not help but frown. "The Sith had tried to corrupt me though... If they hadn't managed it, then what makes you think anyone else could? I didn't want to walk the path of darkness, I didn't want that at all. I've resisted those temptations for most of my life..." And I will continue to do so for as long as I remain in control of my own actions.

Perhaps the Jedi would have been a better option, if the Tyrant of Panatha had never found her, if the Sith had never come to Coruscant, then maybe... Just maybe... Jyn would have existed now as Rhiari Lorr. A Jedi after her parents.

But that hadn't come to be. She hadn't even been given a chance. And besides, Jedi could be just as bad as Sith. In her eyes at least. Just as potent across the Galaxy, just as unwieldy. An iron tight grip over those who followed them. An unseen grasp on those they supposedly protected. Hot air, the lot of them. Where had they been when Coruscant fell? Where had they been when the Tyrant slaughtered their innocents and wrought oppression on the Core?

When he turned his attentions to her curse however she bristled. Did he think that this was the cause of her lack of control? Of her ignorance toward the Force? That actually made her laugh. She inhaled slowly, looking down to watch as her skin turned ashen grey and the veins rose... Then she grit her teeth, and stared back up toward Tirdarius. "I resisted it to perfection" she stated, a slight bite to her tone at this point, "the Force, the darkness, all of it."

She knew how it must have looked from the outside, some days even Jyn didn't understand her affliction, but what she did know was that it was not her doing. Her mind had been torn open, exposed to a whole myriad of emotions without pause that she could not process, she could not contain... Had Arthos never gotten his filthy hands on her she would have remained perfectly ordinary. As though the Force had never so much as passed through her.

"I made my choice" she said, "I decided to take myself away from these stupid little fights that seem to wind up on a Galactic scale. But evidently making a choice and enforcing it is not enough, because yet again I'm finding myself pulled right back in. You hint at the fact that there's no right or wrong choice, but what do you know? I'm so... So tired. Tired of resisting, of fighting. I don't have a choice."

[member="Tirdarius"]